Walkabout Character Generation - Phase 0: Birth Circumstances

For the next few posts, I'm going to present the character generation system that I've been working on for Walkabout. With the death of G+, I haven't been getting a lot of feedback or comments on my posts, but if anyone out there is still reading, any responses to this series of posts would be ,much appreciated. 

The web of relationships that define a person start to weave together before they are born. Relationships between places, individuals, and cultures provide the initial nodes that a person spins into their identity. It is into these foundational nodes that new relationship threads can be entwined, as a person finds their place in the world.

Understanding a Wayfarer character in Walkabout begins by learning who their parents were and the place where they were born. Those called to be Wayfarers come from all parts of the world, many from the shanties clinging to the outskirts of the ruined cities or the surviving rural towns in the reclaimed wilderness, others from the nomadic communities that travel the rivers, roads, and rails. A few wayfarers have origins among the neo-primitives who turned their back on technology, the sheltered descendants of the wealthy who weathered the apocalypse deep below or high above the ground, or the accursed and mutated outlanders who didn’t survive the apocalypse completely intact.

A wayfarer can’t control where they came from, but the circumstances of their birth can shape the way they choose to bring balance back to the world. How much they allow the circumstances of their past to define the destiny of their future is entirely up to them.

While the holistic interconnectedness of all things might spread an infinite spider’s web of relationship links across time and space, and while it might be possible to trace the influences on an individual back over generations, a lot of those influences are miniscule and have little chance of manifesting in the stories of the Wayfarers. To set the context for the beginning of a Wayfarer’s story, begin with their parents. Roll d8/d10/d12, then allocate these results between Mother (indicating where she grew up), Father (indicating where he grew up) and Community (indicating where the two of them settled to bring up their family).

Roll	Mother	Father	Community
1	Never known (died in childbirth)	Never known (left mother before birth)	Refugees – Picked up by a Convoy
2-3	Edge Town	Edge Town	Mother’s home (if mother “Never known”, use the Father’s home)
4-5	Rural Town	Rural Town	Father’s home (if father “Never known”, use the Mother’s home)
6-7	Camp	Camp	Edge Town
8-9	Convoy	Convoy	Rural Town
10-11	Bunker	Bunker	Camp
12	Loners	Loners	Loners

 

For each parent, now determine the culture they belonged to by rolling a d8.

Roll	Culture
	Edge Town	Rural Town	Camp	Convoy	Bunker	Loners
1	Parent died during character’s childhood
2-3	Scavenger	Cultivator	Tribal	Nomad	Scavenger	Tribal
4-5	Cultivator	Scavenger	Nomad	Scavenger	Sheltered	Outlander
6-7	Nomad	Nomad	Cultivator	Tribal	Outlander	Sheltered
8	Outlander	Tribal	Outlander	Skyfarer	Skyfarer	Skyfarer

 

 

Parent’s Highest Attribute – Roll d8 twice. Choose one of the results to determine the highest attribute (equivalent to d10), the other result determines the second highest attribute (equivalent to d8). If the two results indicate the same attribute, it is automatically considered the highest attribute (equivalent to d12).

Roll	Scavenger	Cultivator	Nomad	Tribal	Outlander	Sheltered	Skyfarer
1	Physical	Social	Physical	Physical	Mental	Social	Physical
2	Mental	Mental	Mental	Social	Paranormal	Mental	Paranormal

 

Roll	Edge Town	Rural Town	Camp	Convoy	Bunker	Loners
3	Social	Physical	Physical	Physical	Social	Physical
4	Mental	Social	Social	Mental	Mental	Paranormal

 

Roll         Attribute

5              Physical

6              Social

7              Mental

8              Paranormal

Random Occupations – roll d8 twice. One of these dice will determine a possible occupation based on the culture or location of the parent’s upbringing (on a 1-4 the occupation is based on the parent’s culture, on a 5-8 the occupation is based on their location), the second die determines a possible basic occupation based on the parent’s highest attribute. Choose whether the character’s parent dabbled in both of these occupations, or whether they mastered one of them.

If either parent left (or died) during this period when the environment for the upbringing was established, Wayfarer’s you may choose to skip this occupational roll. That parent has contributed their genetic influence to the child, they are no longer around to influence the upbringing.

First Roll

Roll	Scavenger	Cultivator	Nomad	Tribal	Outlander	Sheltered	Skyfarer
1	Apprentice	Dirt Farmer	Driver	Brave	Drifter	Archaeologist	Cloud Farmer
2	Archaeologist	Drover	Mechanic	Gatherer	Infiltrator	Artist	Cloud Talker
3	Junker	Harvester	Navigator	Herbalist	Predator	Courtier	Librarian
4	Merchant	Jackaroo	Outrider	Shaman	Psion	Debutante	Marine
5	Prospector	Logger	Raider	Spirit Talker	Shadow	Librarian	Mechanic
6	Tinkerer	Swagman	Road Mystic	Trapper	Visionary	Paper Pusher	Scientist

 

Roll	Edge Town	Rural Town	Camp	Convoy	Bunker	Loner
7	Burglar	Miner	Crafter	Grease Monkey	Dirt Farmer	Dirt Farmer
8	Engineer	Outrider	Gatherer	Merchant	Marine	Gatherer
9	Prospector	Preacher	Herbalist	Navigator	Mechanic	Merchant
10	Raider	Rider	Lorekeeper	Raider	Servant	Spirit Talker
11	Sparky	Stockman	Mythweaver	Tracker	Sparky	Swagman
12	Tinkerer	Swagman	Tracker	Visionary	Paper Pusher	Tracker

Second Roll

Roll	Physical	Social	Mental	Paranormal
1	Bandit	Bandit	Apprentice	Cultist
2	Blacksmith	Cultist	Bodyguard	Fisher
3	Guard	Drifter	Crafter	Gambler
4	Harvester	Entertainer	Dirt Farmer	Gutterpunk
5	Jailer	Gambler	Guard	Medic
6	Labourer	Gutterpunk	Leatherworker	Prophet
7	Mercenary	Merchant	Medic	Psion
8	Raider	Nurse	Mercenary	Shadow
9	Slave	Preacher	Nurse	Spirit Talker
10	Survivor	Prophet	Tinkerer	Survivor
11	Thug	Rider	Trainee	Trainee
12	Trooper	Slave	Trooper	Visionary

 

Write three or more sentences, about your earliest memories. Include a sentence about each of the parents you knew, and another about the place where your earliest memory of them occurred. If you want to write more sentences, you could reveal information about their occupations, the virtues they tried to instil in you, any siblings, cousins, or extended family who might have influenced you in some way.

Note: Parental Origins

The parents defined through these earliest roles are the two people who contributed genetically to the birth of the character. But they may not necessarily be the two people who had the strongest influence on the character as they grew up. If a biological father leaves, a character could be raised by two mothers, a similar situation could see two fathers as the influencers in a child’s life; a single parent is a valid option too. In a post-apocalyptic environment, a person tends to be raised by whoever cares for them most… in some cases this might mean that the individuals learns by fending for themselves because there is simply no one else around with the time or inclination to raise a child. This is why the sentences are just as important as the dice rolls when creating a character; the dice rolls prompt the sentences, the sentences give context for the dice rolls.