Godwalker of the Savage and Dark King of the Beasts

Powerful avatars know what it is to live a symbol. They know that the eddies and ripples of the collective consciousness shape, and are shaped by, vast forms that lie beneath the surface of what we think of as ‘real’, and who we think of as ‘ourselves’. Surprisingly few of them think hard about where the shapes come from – the reasons the Archetypes emerge and the reasons they stay with us.

Enter Donald Ramses.

No one has found the Aboriginal tribe that brought Ramses up. No one has ever tracked down the degenerate, possibly inbred, family that spawned him. No one has ever divined the location of the cave in which he was suckled by wild beasts, surrounded by gnawed bones. This is because none of these things ever existed. The current Godwalker of the Savage was born in an upper middle-class household in Melbourne, did well in school and began his PhD in anthropology in 1983.

Not satisfied with sitting and reading the literature, Ramses headed into the highlands of Papua New Guinea, one of the few places in the world of which little is still known. His stated intention was to study the tribes of the area and detail the gradual civilising effect that he was sure contact with the developed world would bring.

The medical profession described what happened next as a psychotic episode. Certainly when he reappeared in Port Moresby he was ragged, filthy and running a severe fever. He was tight-lipped to the psychologists who treated him, but reputedly told an orderly, himself down from the highlands, of a man and a woman who had taken him away from his work, a ‘father’ who had shown him the power of living a life “unbounded by made things” and phantasmagoric tales of a beast with the face of a man.

Faded and torn police and hospital records document his escape from the hospital. No doubt some lonely, worn-down captain of a fishing boat remembers taking him back to Australia. His trail vanishes somewhere in the deep, dark wilderness.

The few reliable accounts of meetings with the now Godwalker report a physically powerful, utterly ruthless and (more disturbingly) highly intelligent man. His hair and beard are matted into dreadlocks, and have changed colour from middling brown to a deep red. His skin, burned by the sun and covered in dust, is almost the same colour. He smiles the smile of a demonic Cheshire Cat and tells stories about the wolf-children of India, the lycanthropes of legend and the power that can be had by abandoning the artificial distinction between human being and wild animal.

Donald Ramses – The Manticore

Personality: Hannibal Lecter in Silence of the Lambs. He’s not psychotic or a sadist. In fact, he’s usually an agreeable sort of person, but he does so enjoy the power that can be gained by abandoning civilisation.

Obsession: The Manticore. The symbol of a creature partly human, partly animal but not truly either is a powerful one for Ramses, and it encompasses perfectly what he aspires to.

Rage Passion: Attempts to tame the wild. Hunting is fine in Ramses’ book, but zoos piss him off mightily.

Fear Passion: Floods (Violence). He got caught in a flash flood during the 1990 monsoon and still feels twinges in his neck sometimes.

Noble Passion: Australian Aborigines. The traditional hunter-gatherer lifestyle may not have been quite perfect in his eyes, but it was closer than what Australia’s indigenous population was forced into. Ramses does what he can to help them stand on their collective feet again.

Wound Points: 97 (Yes, this is 20 points higher than his Body score. Ramses traded for some extras from a Merchant avatar back in 1986.)

Body: 77 (Made of Leather)
Skills: Cross-Country Lope 40%; Fight Tooth and Nail 70%; Shrug Off Injury 70%; Toxin Resistance 25%

Speed: 80 (Striking Snake)
Skills: Catch Things 50%; Dodge 45%; Driving 15%; Initiative 55%; Silent Hunter 52%; Throw Darts 60%

Mind: 74 (Deep Thinker)
Skills: Hunter’s Eyes 55%; Indigenous Dialects 20%; Mythological Symbols 42%; Teeth in the Darkness 44%

Soul: 99 (Something Else Entirely)
Skills: Avatar: the Savage 99%; Compelling Words 31%; Lying 26%; Man-Eater 65%; Symbolsight 40%

Madness Meters:
Violence 7H/1F
Unnatural 8H/2F
Helplessness 4H/0F
Isolation 6H/1F
Self 2H/0F

Possessions: Nothing. Ramses will occasionally wrap himself in animal skins against the cold, or sharpen some wooden darts (which he often coats with the venom of whatever kind of snake he can catch), but he doesn’t retain possessions for long.

Avatar: the Savage – As described in the Unknown Armies rulebook, Ramses’ Godwalker channel automatically stops any machine requiring a chemical or electrical power source (ie. steam engines, guns, mobile phones) within a mile of his person from working. Ramses was actually brought up to think in kilometres, but he considered miles to have more historical significance.

Driving – Note that, due to his Godwalker channel, Ramses can never use this skill.

Man Eater – While the outback does contain more than a few human bones with Ramses’ tooth marks on them, this skill represents his ability to use body language and suggestion to trigger the part of the human brain that says “predator!” This goes beyond normal intimidation (although it works as that too), triggering a Violence check with a level equal to the tens digit of the roll.