Character Creation
Every story has at least one character at its forefront. This character is a bundle of decisions, history, ability, and motivations that are represented both mechanically through this system, and socially through your actions as a Player. This section will walk through how to represent your character mechanically --- the social aspect can only be provided by you.
In Punk Galactic, like all C22 Systems, you will need both a deck of cards and a character sheet to represent your character. You can see an example of these on the next page. The character sheet has three sections where your decisions shape your character. These are your character’s Potentials, Species, and Skills.
The Deck
The deck of cards represents your character’s physical strength and abilities. Think, how well they can dexterously cut wire or consistently do they say the right things? The character’s natural abilities are captured this way, so as the character’s body improves, so will the deck of cards.
Potentials
Primary Potentials are the bridge between the cards and the Skills. These are not used directly, but setting their values creates the framework and direction for the entire character.
Skills
Character Skills represent a character’s experiences. A character that climbs a lot will have a higher value in their Climb Skill. A character that bandages up allies more often will have a higher value in their Medicine Skill. As the character grows and learns, they will be granted opportunities to increase these Skills.
Combat Stats
This collection of stats tracks your character’s Armor, Avoidance, Awareness, Health, Movement, Recovery Points, and both Resistances.
Items
The gear you bring with you on your adventures can open options for you that your Skills alone cannot. What you are carrying is vitally important to your character and can be tracked on page 2 of the character sheet.
Maneuvers
A collection of the six special combat actions your character can use in combat encounters. You can know more but you can only be prepared to use these six in a mission.
Magic & Powers
Your character’s abilities tied to their Cast Magic or other Powers. A collection of the unique narrative Styles of your character's Magic and the list of their known mechanical Effects.
Character Creation Methods
The SRD explains the Free-form method of character creation. It is the most flexible but also the most time consuming. It is useful to perfectly craft the exact type of character you want to be.
Creating a character with this method allows you to create your character starting with any of Skills, Potentials, or the Deck first. The default order is to decide Potentials first, then the Deck, then your Skills to avoid making any illegal characters.
While this method is not the best method for first time players, it is the only method available in the SRD due to the setting dependent nature of the other methods. To help with these difficulties, character creation follows the creation of three different characters so you can see examples first hand:
Samson, a standard fighter in a high fantasy world
Emily, a modern-day spy with access to magic
Jade, the captain of an intergalactic trading vessel
Potentials
Mechanically, a character is started by defining their Potentials. These Potentials define a character’s ability to learn and retain Skills. They act as the bridge between the cards and the Skills.
Potentials dictate how many Skills your character can know and are tied to the Skills to direct the Skill’s growth. Before we talk about the relationship between Skills and Potentials, you should understand the eight Potentials.
The eight Potentials are as follows: Strength, Intellect, Finesse, Ingenuity, Fortitude, Willpower, Presence, and Charisma. These Potentials are connected by themes to the four card Suits found in any common playing card deck.
• Diamonds are associated with the theme of Power, which is Strength and Intellect
• Spades are associated with the theme of Quickness, which is Finesse and Ingenuity
• Hearts are associated with the theme of Resilience, which is Fortitude and Willpower
• Clubs are associated with the theme of Social, which is Presence and Charisma
Level 1 characters start with a value of 2 in each Potential. You can then increase the values of these Potentials by a total of 8 with no single Potential exceeding a value of 5. A character will be granted additional chances to increase their Potential at later levels.
Assign your starting Potentials right now. If this is your first character, I recommend picking 3 Potentials to increase to 4 and then two more to set at 3.
| Potential | What It Represents | Associated Skills |
|---|---|---|
| Strength (Str) | physical power | Athlectics, Brawling, Weapon Skills |
| Intellect(Int) | mental power | Investigation, Navigation, Magic Skills |
| Finesse (Fin) | physical quickness | Avoidance, Stealth, Weapon Skills |
| Ingenuity (Ing) | mental quickness | Manipulation, Tinkering |
| Fortitude (Fort) | physical resilience | Environment Resist, Health, Resist Physical |
| Willpower (Will) | mental resilience | Awareness, Mysticism, Resist Mental |
| Presence (Pres) | physical social control | Animal Handling, Authority, Misdirection |
| Charisma (Cha) | mental social control | Insight, Persuassion |
Potential Examples
Samson is focused on physical strength and power, so he assigns the following values to his Potentials.
Str – 4 Int – 2
Fin – 2 Ing – 3
Fort – 4 Will – 4
Pres – 3 Cha – 2
Emily is focused on quickness both of mind and body, so she assigns the following values to her Potentials.
Str – 2 Int – 3
Fin – 4 Ing – 4
Fort – 2 Will – 2
Pres – 4 Cha – 3
Jade is focused on both survival and their social skills, so Jade assign the following values to their Potentials.
Str – 2 Int – 3
Fin – 4 Ing – 2
Fort – 3 Will – 3
Pres – 3 Cha – 4
Setting Up Your Deck
| Value of Str + Int | Value of Fin + Ing | Value of Fort + Will | Value of Pres + Cha | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| < 6 | 3 of Diamonds | 3 of Spades | 3 of Hearts | 3 of Clubs |
| 6 | 5 of Diamonds | 5 of Spades | 5 of Hearts | 5 of Clubs |
| >6 | 7 of Diamonds | 7 of Spades | 7 of Hearts | 7 of Clubs |
Now that Potentials are set, the character’s individual deck can be built. A character’s starter deck will always contain the following cards from a standard 54-card deck of playing cards: all 2's, 4's, 6's, 8's plus a Red Joker and a Black Joker.
The remaining 4 cards will depend on your character’s Potentials. The combination of the Potentials relating to each suit will determine whether you add a three, five, or seven to your deck for that respective suit.
Add the character’s Strength and Intellect, their Finesse and Ingenuity, their Fortitude and Willpower, then their Presence and Charisma, and consult the chart to the right.
Deck Examples
Samson
Str (4) + Int (2) = 6; Samson adds a 5 of Diamonds
Fin (2) + Ing (3) = 5; Samson adds a 3 of Spades
Fort (4) + Will (4) = 8; Samson adds a 7 of Hearts
Pres (3) + Cha (2) = 5; Samson adds a 3 of Clubs
Emily
Str (2) + Int (3) = 5; Samson adds a 3 of Diamonds
Fin (4) + Ing (4) = 8; Samson adds a 7 of Spades
Fort (2) + Will (2) = 4; Samson adds a 3 of Hearts
Pes (4) + Cha (3) = 7; Samson adds a 7 of Clubs
Jade
Str (2) + Int (3) = 5; Samson adds a 3 of Diamonds
Fin (4) + Ing (2) = 6; Samson adds a 5 of Spades
Fort (3) + Will (3) = 6; Samson adds a 5 of Hearts
Pres (3) + Cha (4) = 7; Samson adds a 7 of Clubs
Skills
With your Potentials and Deck set, the next major step is to define your character by what they have already experienced. To do this, you decide your character’s Skills through the spending of Skill points. Level one characters start with 16 and are given more each level. Skill points can be used to purchase a new Specific Skill or to make a current Specific Skill better. Making a Specific Skill better costs additional Skill points.
There are two types of Skills: General Skills, which all characters can use, and Specific Skills, which must be learned. Specific Skills are directly related to a General Skill but are narrower in focus for their use. Every Specific Skill belongs to their most closely related General Skill. The image below shows an example of this relationship.
The name of the General Skill is listed to the left in the red banner on your character sheet. In the case of the above example, this is the Awareness Skill. The names listed on the right of the red banner are the Specific Skills: in this case, only Listen and Spot have been learned. The number in the box to the right indicates the benefits gained when using that Specific Skill.
You will also see the heart symbol in the box in the red General Skill banner. This means that whenever a hearts card is used for the check, the Skill Check will get an additional +1.
You cannot have more total ranks of Specific Skills in single a General Skill than in its governing Potential. The governing Potential is listed next to the name of the General Skill, abbreviated in parenthesis. For the example above, Awareness’s governing Potential is Willpower.
When choosing your Skills and spending your Skill points, you need 1 Skill point to increase a Specific Skill to rank 1 but you need to spend 2 Skill points to increase the Specific Skill to rank 2. 3 Skill points are required to increase a Specific Skill to rank 3 and 4 for rank 4. Specific Skills cannot be higher than rank 4. See Character Progression for more details.
Each setting will define their own available General Skills, but a generic Skill list is shown to the right. For the complete list of the Default Skills.
List of General Skill
Athletics
Avoidance
Authority
Awareness
Brawling
Environment Resist
Handle Animal
Health
Investigation
Insight
Manipulation
Misdirection
Mysticism
Navigation
Persuasion
Resist Mental
Resist Physical
Stealth
Tinker
Setting Independent Skills
For all C22 based systems, a few General Skills will always be included as they create the stats that define a character. These five Skills are Avoidance, Awareness, Health, Resist Mental, and Resist Physical.
Points spent in these Skills will improve derived Potentials of a character in addition to the other benefits gained when improving a General Skill. Avoidance will improve a character’s ability to avoid damage, Awareness will increase the character’s ability to identify dangers, Health will increase the character’s overall resilience against damage, while the Resist Mental and Resist Physical Skill help a character deal with negative status effects.
Additionally, these five Skills have a few Specific Skills granted to all characters by default.
Awareness: All characters know the Skill Spot and Listen, unless the character is permanently Blind or permanently Deaf. Then the respective Specific Skill is not known.
Health: All characters know the Recovery Skill First Aid, which permanently heals a character. Recovering Skills are discussed the Skills Checks section, and later in Health and Recovery.
The Resist Mental and Resist Physical Skills are discussed in detail earlier in this SRD in the section describing effects and statuses, Resist Skills.
Skills Examples
Samson Example:
Samson wants to be resilient for his team. He spends 2 points in the Health Skill and 1 point in each of the Resist Mental and Resist Physical Skills. For the Health Skill, Samson uses his points to learn the Recuperate Skill and then to increase the rank of First Aid by 1.
For his Resist Mental Skill, he increases his resistance to Stun and puts one point in the Stun. For his Resist Physical Skill, he puts one point in Knockdown to gain similar resistance. In both cases, this also increases his overall resistance to mental and physical effects by 1.
The results of Samson’s choices are shown below and to the right.
Emily
Emily wants to be hard to hit and aware of her surroundings. She spends 2 points in the Avoidance Skill and 2 points in the Awareness Skill. Emily uses her first point to learn the Dodge Skill under the Avoidance General Skill. Her second point is used to learn the Shake it Off Recovery Skill under the Avoidance General Skill.
For her Awareness Skill, she spends one point in both the Listen and Spot Skills to bring their ranks up to 1.
The results of Emily’s choices are shown below.
Jade
Jade knows that planets can be filled with unknown dangers, so their body should be more resistant to the dangers found there. Jade spends 3 points in the Resist Physical Skill. They spend one point each on Paralyze, Poison, and Weakened to help ward off any dangers that a planet might contain.
The results of Jade’s choices are shown to the right.
Weapon Skills
For settings where combat and weapons play an important role, you should consider spending some of skill points on your character’s Weapon Skills. This would allow them to learn new maneuvers, giving them more options in combat.
Every Weapon Skill is tied to a type of weapon, and each has the same four Specific Skills: Diamonds Maneuver, Spades Maneuver, Hearts Maneuver and Clubs Maneuver. Therefore, at this point, it is not necessary to choose what specific weapon the character uses, only how skilled they are with that style weapon.
Spending the first point in one of these Specific Skills teaches the character a new Maneuver unique to that weapon type. Maneuvers grant new tactical options a character can use in combat. The more Maneuvers a character knows, the more skilled they are with the weapon. Maneuvers and Weapon Skills are explained in detail in maneuvers.
If you want to know the weapon types different equipment falls under, or what maneuvers are avilable for each weapon, check the equipment section and the default maneuvers section.
For new Players, it is recommended to spend one to two Skill Points total on Weapon Skills. If your character does not intend to use weapons in combat or the setting is combat light, consider spending no points at all at this step.
Samson
Samson’s experience is as a mercenary, so he takes one rank in two of his Weapon’s Specific Skills. Samson has decided he wants to wield a battle axe and a shield, so he spends 1 point in each weapon. He checks the default maneuver section for Melee Slash Medium weapons and chooses the Clubs Maneuver.
Next for his shield, he checks the Maneuver Appendix for Barrier, Crush, Medium weapons, and chooses the Hearts Maneuver.
Emily
Emily avoids combat by staying out of sight and outsmarting the enemy. Therefore, she only learns one maneuver for her shuriken. She looks at the Short Pierce Light maneuvers in the default maneuver section and selects the Diamonds Maneuver.
Jade
Jade is always prepared for a deal to go south and therefore has a lot of experience with a laser pistol. They look at the Short Slash Light Maneuvers and spend 3 points in one Maneuver to represent their mastery of it. The first rank costs 1 skill point while the second costs 2 for a total of 3 points. Then they spend the remaining 1 point to gain the first rank of another maneuver.
Jade takes the rank 2 of the maneuver instead for their first maneuver.
Magic and Powers Skills
The default magic system for C22 Systems is slightly chaotic and unpredictable as the characters react and shape the magic with their creativity. Refer to your specific setting for the exact rules on magic or powers in your setting. For this section, the term Magic will be used, but any type of power can be used the same way.
For the default system, magic elements/types are assigned to a suit and then points are spent to improve that type of magic. On the character sheet there is a Cast Magic Skill box for each suit. The first Magic Skill learned must be associated with the Diamonds suit. Once Diamonds magic has been learned, the remaining suits can be learned in any order.
For example, if fire-based magic is chosen for the diamonds suit, then Skill Points can be spent to learn new ways to manipulate fire magic. Then if you would like your character to learn Ice magic, you can then associate it with Spades, Hearts, or Clubs since those Cast Magic Skill boxes have not been filled.
For each point spent on a Magic Skill, the character is granted another Style or Effect they can add to their spells of that type. A Style is how the character casts their magic while Effects are the penalties or benefits the spells impart outside of their damage. Styles are mainly a character’s unique magical flavor while effects have a more rigid ruleset. When a Style is learned, a free Effect is learned and becomes associated with that Style. You can learn more effects to associate with a single style, but you can only use one Effect per style your spell utilizes during a spell cast. More details can be found in the section magic and powers. It is highly recommended to read that chapter before spending any points in Magic Skills.
The governing Potential of an element is the mental Potential associated with the suit of the character’s Cast Magic General Skill. So, regardless of which element is assigned to their Diamonds Cast Magic Skill, the associated Potential will always be Intellect. For Spades it is Ingenuity, for Hearts it is Willpower, and for Clubs it is Charisma.
Samson and Jade do not utilize magic, so they will not spend any points on Magic Skills.
Emily
Emily wants to sneak past guards more easily. She spends two points in the Magic Air General Skill to accomplish this. Her first point must be her Style which she decides is Fragrance. This grants her a free Effect, so she learns the Charm effect for her Air magic. She wants more tools to avoid detection so for her second point she learns another style and gets the free effect. She takes the Slice style and the Distracted Effect. Her final results look like the image on the right.
Wrapping Up Skills
Now that you understand Skills, you can spend all sixteen Skill Points to create your character’s experiences. Various examples and more detailed information on how Skills are used and how to handle their results during play are described in Skills.
Refer to your setting for the most accurate list of available Skills. For the complete list and descriptions of all the default Skills in a C22 System please check default Skills.
Samson
Samson has spent 2 Skills Points on Weapon Skills, 2 on the Health Skill, and 1 on each of Resist Physical and Resist Mental. He has 10 Skill Points left to spend, which he will use to improve his combat options and general dungeon delving success.
Samson does the following :
He is an excellent jumper, so he spends 3 points in Athletics, one to teach himself Jump. Then he uses the next two points to improve his Jump Specific Skill, making it a 2.
He is skilled in combat, so he spends 2 points on the Brawling Skill to teach himself the Block and Exploit Opening Specific Skills.
Samson was the voice of reason among his mercenary group, so he spends 2 points on the Persuasion Skill to learn the first rank of both the Calm Skill and the Entice Skill.
He spent a bit of time playing games with fellow mercenaries, so he can tell a cheat when he sees one. He spends 1 point on the Insight Skill to teach himself Learn Tell.
During combat Samson uses his voice to draw attention to himself, so he spends 1 point in the Misdirection Skill to teach himself Attract Attention.
Finally, Samson is known for fixing things around his group’s camp, so he spends 1 point on the Tinker Skill to teach himself the Repair Skill.
Emily
Emily has spent 1 Skill Point on Weapon Skills, 2 on Avoidance, 3 on Awareness, and 2 on Air Magic. She has 8 Skill Points left to spend, which she will use to improve her ability to hide and ability to get into places unnoticed.
Emily does the following:
She is excellent at staying out of sight, so she spends 4 points on the Stealth Skill to teach herself Hide in Shadows at rank 1. The next two points are required to increase Hide in Shadows to rank 2. The last point is spent to learn the first rank of Move Silently.
Emily needs to unlock doors and disable traps, so she spends 1 point in the Tinker Skill to teach herself Disable Device at rank 1.
She finds alternate entryways into parties and events, so she spends 1 point to learn the Athletics Skill to learn Climb.
On some occasions Emily needs to look different, so she spends 1 point in the Misdirection Skill to learn Disguise.
Jade
Jade has spent 4 Skill Points on Weapon Skills, and 3 on Resist Physical. They have 9 points left, which they will use to improve their ability to negotiate in the lawlessness of space.
Jade does the following:
For Jade, the art of getting a good deal is the most important skill to have in the smuggling business, so they spend 3 points in the Persuasion Skill. They spend one point in each Entice, Rile, and Comfort to learn all three Skills.
Jades knows that a good ship captain needs to be able to lead, so they spend 3 points in the Authority Skill to learn and improve the Enlist Help Skill.
When making a deal, Jades knows sometimes it’s best to not tell the whole truth, so they spend 1 point in the Manipulation Skill to learn Deception.
More importantly, Jades thinks it’s best to know when someone else is holding out on you, so they spend 1 points in the Insight Skill to learn Read Body Language.
Finally, some deals just do not work out, so Jade spends 1 point in the Athletics Skill to learn Sprint.
Combat Stats
With Potentials, Cards, and now Skills all selected, your character is mostly complete. At this point all major decisions have been made. This next section will show you how to calculate the statistics that define your character: character Health, Awareness, Avoidance, Armor, initiative, Recovery Points, and movement. The following section will walk you through how to determine each value based on your character’s Skills and Potentials.
Write these values on the second page top center of your character sheet.
Armor
Armor is a direct reduction of damage taken, calculated after the attack is avoided or not. At first level a character’s Armor is only increased by items or magical spells.
Avoidance
The character’s Avoidance is a measure of their ability to avoid attacks and abilities. Even with a high Avoidance, not all damage will be avoided. Some damage is always taken from an attack Avoidance just allows your character to negate half of it.
A character’s base Avoidance is 4 and can be increased from equipment or from General Skills in the same way that Health increases. The symbol for Avoidance is shown on the right.
Avoidance = 4 + Avoidance from Equipment + Avoidance from Skills.
Awareness
Awareness is a character’s ability to passively notice their surroundings. A character’s base Awareness is 4 and can be increased from General Skills in the same way that Health or Avoidance increases. The symbol for Awareness is an eye like the image on the right.
Awareness = 4 + Awareness from Skills
Health
A character’s Health value is a combination of the damage, stress, and fatigue of a battle, not just a loss of blood. Not all attacks draw blood, but the stress and fatigue of avoiding attacks still take a toll on a character. At first level, a character’s Health is equal to 8 plus the passive benefits gained from General Skills. lus the passive benefits gained from General Skills.
Passive Health is granted as characters progress down the Skill trees for the General Skill. Expect level 1 characters to have between 8 and 14 Health to start.
Movement
Movement is the distance a character can travel using one movement action. Movement actions are discussed in the section Encounters.
A character’s Movement is equal to 6 meters (15ft) or 3 hexes by default.
Recovery Points
The last stat is Recovery Points. Recovery Points are one of the few methods that allow Players to regain Health. First level Players always start with two Recovery Points and will gain more as they gain levels. They are covered in detail in Health and Recovery.
