Not all threats come from thugs wielding assault rifles or raging Epideromancers.
What would you consider dangerous? A punk with a gun? Or, perhaps, an angry Entropomancer? Some dangers do not always come in the form of a physical conflict.
Born into a poor family, John read books as rapidly as he could find, steal, or buy them. His family saw his potential, and scrapped together enough money to send him to college. He did well there, and was on his way to becoming a successful academic. Late one night in a bar when he was having a rare drink, an unknown narquis slipped something in his drink. As far as John has been able to determine, it had the same effect as Universal Perceptual Solvent. He had a very, very bad trip that last for nine days. At the end of that time, his sense of identity, and his certainity of what the world was like were shattered. This put him in a perfect oppurtunity for becoming an adept. He managed to learn quickly, and was active in the Occult Underground within the following year. He’s been in the game for two more years since then, and has picked up an astounding array of talents. Some are as of a result of deals with Merchants, some are a result of hard work.
He is currently scouring the city for information, much as he has been doing for the past nine months. He is intrested in obtaining the Necronomicon, or perhaps the ritual Seek the Hidden Tome. To make ends meet magickally, he works as a detective. Want to know your enemy’s True Name? He can find that out for you. Want to learn how to make an Unspeakable Servant? He can do that too. He charges rare books, rituals, artifacts, information, and the like for his services.
John could come into the game either as a powerful ally or mentor, or as a deadly enemey. If the PCs need to know how to make a Homunculus, he might be willing to teach them, for a price… As an enemey, he wouldn’t fight them head-on, but would instead work behind the lines as a seller and disperser of damaging information. Taboos, details of their defenses, that sort of thing.
Personality: (Gemini) Quiet and introspective. He doesn’t speak often or loudly, but when he does, he speaks with the voice of wisdom.
Your Name: John Walker
Your Obsession: (Bibliomancy) The point where knowledge is transfered from a book to the mind, but yet the book remains essential for the power of the knowledge.
Rage Stimulus: Censorship. He despises the very thought of someone banning or stopping the flow of information and knowledge. Naturally, this puts him at odds with the Sleepers.
Fear Stimulus: (Helplessness) Fire. His old library burned to the ground, and the experience has scarred his psyche. He still has nightmares about that fateful day…
Noble Stimulus: Education. Put simply, he believes with proper education, the woes of this world would be lessened, or negated entirely.
Wound Points: 40
Body: 40 (Sickly)
General Athletics 20%, Struggle 15%, Go Without Sleep 30%
Speed: 50 (So-So)
Dodge 20%, Driving 15%, Initiative 25%, Firearms 40%
Mind: 80 (Savant)
General Education 50%, Notice 30%, Conceal 20%, Photographic Memory 60%, Occult 50%, Medicine 30%
Soul: 80 (Amazing)
Charm 30%, Lying 15%, Magick: Bibliomancy 70%, Painting 15%, Aura Sight 35%, Symbolsight 35%
Violence: 4 Hardened 3 Failed
The Unnatural: 7 Hardened 2 Failed
Helplessness: 3 Hardened 1 Failed
Isolation: 4 Hardened 1 Failed
Self: 2 Hardened 1 Failed
School Or Archetype: Bibliomancy.
Taboos: As per Bibliomancy.
Firearms: Ruger Mark II semi-automatic (caliber .22 long rifle, capacity 10, max damage 35), Colt Viper revolver (caliber .38 Special, capacity 6, max damage 50), Glock Model 17 semi-automatic (caliber 9mm Parabellum, capacity 17, max damage 50).
Hand-To-Hand Weapons: Folding knife (damage bonus +3).
Rituals: Medicine Bag, The Ritual Of Union, Back Monkey, Seek The Lost Tome, Spellbreaker, Lead Into Gold, Summon Unspeakable Servant, Create Homunculus.
Artifacts: John knows how to create artifacts.
Possessions: A HUGE library. It has untold number of books inside of it, enough to hold plenty of bibliomatic charges. Lots of occult books, many unread rituals, and several guns. In terms of possessions other than knowledge and books, he doesn’t really have all that much. Depending on how powerful you want to make him, he could have an Unspeakable Servant and/or a Homunculus.
This dude is actually pretty generic.
He’s just a succesful bibliomancer. Not much more to say about him, except he seems to enjoy guns a bit more then the norm. No custom spells, fancy artifacts, nonstandard rituals, esoteric skills, nothing.
Even then, a GM has to flesh him out a bit more. What’s typically in his Traveling Library? What are some of his choicer books? What kind of Defenses does his Library have?
It’s usable, but it isn’t interesting.
“You really think he’s the same guy?”
“Thats what the divinations said. You do believe me, don’t you?”
“I believe you. It’s just, it’s hard to believe that wimpy little guy could somehow be responsible for the death of, well, anyone. Look at him. He’s got a gun, yeah, but he probably doesn’t know how to use it. Even if he did, what good would it do against a fleskworker?”
“Hey, I just read the bones.”
“I know, I know…”
Meet John Walker. Most wouldn’t consider him dangerous. If they did, it would probably only be because he has a gun. I mean, seriously? A little guy like that, with his nose stuck in a book all day couldn’t possibly be a danger to anyone. Everyone knows bookworms aren’t dangerous. Right?
Personality: (Gemini) Quiet and introspective. He doesn’t speak often or loudly, but when he does, he speaks with the voice of wisdom.
Your Name: John Walker
Your Obsession: (Bibliomancy) The point where knowledge is transfered from a book to the mind, but yet the book remains essential for the power of the knowledge.
Rage Stimulus: Censorship. He despises the very thought of someone banning or stopping the flow of information and knowledge. Naturally, this puts him at odds with the Sleepers.
Fear Stimulus: (Helplessness) Fire. His old library burned to the ground, and the experience has scarred his psyche. He still has nightmares about that fateful day…
Noble Stimulus: Education. Put simply, he believes with proper education, the woes of this world would be lessened, or negated entirely.
Wound Points: 35
Body: 35 (Sickly)
General Athletics 15%, Struggle 15%, Go Without Sleep 30%
Speed: 50 (So-So)
Dodge 20%, Driving 15%, Initiative 30%, Firearms 35%
Mind: 85 (Savant)
General Education 30%, Notice 50%, Conceal 15%, Photographic Memory 60%,
Occult 60%, Medicine 15%
Soul: 70 (Amazing)
Charm 30%, Lying 15%, Writing 15%, Magick: Bibliomancy 65%, Aura Sight 30%, Symbolsight 30%
Violence: 5 Hardened 3 Failed
The Unnatural: 7 Hardened 3 Failed
Helplessness: 4 Hardened 2 Failed
Isolation: 3 Hardened 0 Failed
Self: 5 Hardened 1 Failed
Firearms: Ruger Mark II semi-automatic (caliber .22 long rifle, capacity 10, max damage 35).
John nows all listed rituals, and some odd and ends he’s picked up over the years. None are really worth noting, except for two. One allows him to move between two spots anywhere in the world. Theoretically. In practice, it requires so much preparation and effort it is actually faster just to drive, let alone fly, there. I mean, he has to get to the other spot first, set it up and… The other ritual is a charging ritual. He has told no one about this little gem. It gives you a significant charge, just like Harmonious Alignment, but instead of the usual steps, it requires you to sacrifice a significant amount of fresh blood, amongst other things. Human blood. See why he hasn’t show it to anyone?
John has been in the game for 4-5 years, considering how one wants to count the time. No one really knows exactly how he became a Bibliomancer, but most guess it was either when he was fired from the university, or when he couldn’t get his books of poems published. Like I said, it doesn’t really matter. John started out small-scale, mostly as an information broker. Even without magick, he had a good idea of what was going on, and could help you out, for a price. Somewhere in his second year he started gaining momentum. You know the deal, right? Rituals, little favors here and there, artifacts and whatnot. He made a few enemies along the way too. One of them was a fleshworker who went by the name Evaline Cebil, among others. She had it out for him not long after he managed to, by all acounts, steal the ritual Medicine Bag from her apartment. What with the way skinners work and it, it was a pretty major blow to her. She
probably could have killed him at any time, but instead waiting, biding her time to try and get her ritual back. In his third year, John started coming into his own. He knew a lot of rituals, had a collection of artifacts and knew how to make more, but it wasn’t enough. He had to have more, more more! He took a couple of months off, then opened a new shop. No more small stuff, this was the real deal. You would pay him, usually in rare books, but sometimes in rituals, artifacts, or even stranger things, and he would get your information for you. It was a pretty clever scheme. John would charge you 2-3 times as much as he needed to work his mojo, so he always came out ahead. He aquired quite a lot of power this way.
John had been at odds with the Sleepers from the begining. He’d always hated censorship, and here were the occult police, doing exactly that. He sold to them a few times in the begining, but only because he had to. As soon as he could, John cut ties with the sleepers. They left him alone for the most part, because, as bad as he was peddling information, at least he had the good sense not to sell info on them, or pass it on to the world above. This changed sometime in the third year. John saw a deal too good to pass up, but the price was high. He had to dish out some info on the Sleepers. He agreeded. Naturally, when this was found out, they went nuts. One thing led to another, and Evaline was contacted. Armed with almost as much knowledge as the Sleepers had about him, she went out to kill John. To this day, nobody really knows what happened. They never found her body, and he refuses to talk about, his face shutting off all emotion whenever anyone brings up the subject. After that fiasco, he shut up his shop again. No one’s seen him around, but there have been some rumors lately…
Possessions: Currently, John is living in. He has a rather large house on the outskirts of town that looks crumbling and useless on the outside, but it suprisingly modern and up-to-date on the inside. John has only one servants of note. He is a man he “bought” from the Bad Man, courtesy of some choice information that was conviently wiped from his mind after the deal was complete. John wishes he could remember what the terms of the deal were, but… yeah. The man he bought is named Gert Derlos. He isn’t an adept, or an avatar, just an average guy. The man’s wife was dying of cancer and he was desperate to find a way to save her. He eventually found the Bad Man. Gert
didn’t have anything the Bad Man wanted at the time, so the Bad Man simply took his free will. Now Gert does whatever his owner wants. (Use the stats for the “Stock Thug” to represent Gert.) His library takes up the basement, ground floor, upstairs, and the attic. (Books of notes to come later. I apologize.) There are a few wards and defense in and around the house. They have the following functions. 1) If anyone other than Gert, John, or one of his very few approved guests enters the house, a mental alarm triggers, warning John. This only works once per person however, until reset. 2) When someone trips the above alarm, 3-5 minor clockworks activate. If the intruder does not give them one of the pre-approved commands, they attack. The clockworks variously look like rats, dogs, and cats.
Clockwork Gaurdians
Body: 30
Attack 30%
Speed: 10
Initiative 05%
3) If the above-mentioned clockworks are defeated, it triggers a second and final warning to John, alerting him to the fact that all his defenses have been breeched.
Traveling Library: One of the first 9 bibles printed, a 17th-century manuscript detailing how to safely summon demons (obviously false), a badly-penned by nevertheless mostly accurate account of the Questing Knight’s actions over the centuries, the novel Dreamcatcher signed by its author, and one or two other books from his main Library.
Much better. I am curious what kind of book learning a bible could give…
Ancient lineages. And Isamul begat Trisan begat Pofofo etc etc and etc etc and etc etc.
The Bible’s good for lots of things, but the most-entertaining for this guy would probably be emulating Samson’s Feats of Strength skill…