It Builds Character: Infinity's Lifepath System, Part 1
So I've talked about Infinity with my friends often enough to be infectious, and now I find myself as a GM for 4 to 6 sessions of gaming in the 23rd (?) century. More games are always good, but now there is a strong pressure for me to master the 2d20 system as soon as possible. One surefire way to do that, for me, is to create a character. And since Infinity is out now on DriveThruRPG, now is as good a time as any to formally delve into the mechanical part of Infinity.
The basics: Infinity's chargen is called the Lifepath System, which is a set of 9 decision points that are mostly handled by random tables. However, you also get 5 life points (LP) that you can spend to forego rolling to instead choose at several points in the Lifepath. Right now, it sounds like I will have a minimum of 4 = 9 - 5 random choices, but there's an optional 12-point character creation option so I am probably missing something here.
At the start, I think it's a good idea to have a very vague idea about the character. Currently I think I would like to come in as an activist-type of character: Smart, well-read, but is capable of getting his hands dirty if needed. I imagine he will also be, as his 2018 ancestors would say, WOKE AF.
Without further ado, let's start!
The first thing I need to fgure out is to determine my character's natural capabilities - gifts that he is environmentally equipped with. All the attributes start at 7 (the human average), and I can lower a stat by 1 to increase a different stat by 1. Let's do that by dropping his Coordination to 6 and increasing his Brawn to 8. I can also spend LPs here to increase an attribute on a one-to-one basis up to a maximum of 10. (And already the 12 LP option thing makes sense.) I don't want to get crazy with my LP just yet, but I did want my character to be smart, so I will spend 1 to increase my character's Intelligence to 8:
Agility = 7
Awareness = 7
Brawn = 8 = 7+1
Coordination = 6 = 7-1
Intelligence = 8 = 7+1
Personality = 7
Willpower = 7
LP: 5 - 1 = 4
Next, I need to determine if he will have an alien heritage, which happens on a roll of 19-20 on a d20. I'd rather stay human for this one, and I'm willing to spend LP for that, but luckily for this choice, I can choose to spend after I roll. (Rolls.) A 14! That means my character is human.
While I kind of want to be from one of the PanOceania worlds, owing to the fact that I have so far read about them the most, I am not so attached in this case, so I will just straight up roll my d20. (Rolls.) 12... Crap, that's a Corporation! How will I reconcile that with an activist? Did I eventually sell out, becoming a sort of Mr. Anderson?
Let's roll with it for now.
Also, when I roll a Corporation, I'm supposed to immediately reroll for my heritage. (Rolls.) 9! I am from PanOceania, after all.
Next, I will take my faction skills. As a Corp, my skills are Lifestyle and Persuade, so I get 1 rank of expertise for each of them. I also get to choose my first signature skill, and since Persuade is a much better fit for my concept than Lifestyle I will go for that. I gain 1 rank of focus in Persuade, as well as the first Persuade Talent, which is known as Charismatic - letting me reroll one d20 on any Persuade test.
Lifestyle (Personality): E1
Persuade (Personality): E1, F1, Charismatic
LP: 4
Quick aside: Attribute + expertise gives you the target number to score a hit, while rolling your focus or lower on a skill means you score an extra hit. So if I need to make a Persuade(Personality) skill test, at this point I need to roll an 8 = 7 (Personality) + 1 (Persuade) or lower on either of the 2d20 to score hits. But if I roll a 1 (my focus), I score two hits with that roll. Let's try that now. (Rolls 2d20.) A 6 and a 10! That's one hit for the six. had my 10 been a 1, it would have been three hits total, one for the 6 and two for the 1.
Now I can determine my homeworld by rolling on the PanOceania table. (Rolls.) A 20, which gets me Svalarheima! I can choose English or German, plus SvalarNorse, for my languages. (Picking German.) I also increase my Willpower and Intelligence by 1 each, and gain 1 rank in Survival. This is my first rank in Survival, so it has to be spent on expertise and not on focus.
Agility = 7
Awareness = 7
Brawn = 8 = 7+1
Coordination = 6 = 7-1
Intelligence = 9 = 7+1+1
Personality = 7
Willpower = 8 = 7+1
Survival (Awareness): E1
Lifestyle (Personality): E1
Persuade (Personality): E1, F1, Charismatic
Languages: German, SvalarNorse
LP: 4
Now it's time to decide how my character grew up. First up is social status, and here I want to spend LP to ensure to reinforce the idea that his early life wasn't too easy. I can choose to either be underclass or demogrant. Hmm... I like Demogrant better, which implies that my character's parents were living within the basic income guaranteed by the PanO government. It doesn't put him at rock-bottom, so it makes sense for him to somehow get tied to the Corporate life as an adult. But there is still enough INJUSTICE there to make him want to fight for something better.
Besides, demogrants give +1 Personality. and two of my skills use that already. Minmaxing, anyone?
Since I already spent a life point here, I can also choose my home environment instead of rolling. I can at least give my character a Happy Home, which grants him another +1 Personality and the Education skill.
Agility = 7
Awareness = 7
Brawn = 8 = 7+1
Coordination = 6 = 7-1
Intelligence = 9 = 7+1+1
Personality = 9 = 7+2
Willpower = 8 = 7+1
Survival (Awareness): E1
Education (Intelligence): E1
Lifestyle (Personality): E1
Persuade (Personality): E1, F1, Charismatic
Languages: German, SvalarNorse
Earnings: 2
LP: 4 - 1 = 3
Let's keep this one random. I need to roll 1d20 and 1d6! (Rolls) I got a 2 on the d20 and a 6 on the d6, which means... I witnessed a secret pregnancy. Huh.
I think I want this to be the pregnancy for a younger sibling. Borne of my mother, the body is actually an LHost for one of the ALEPH AI's aspects! (Think of an LHost as a body that has the subroutine of an Artificial Intelligence for a personality.) Why did ALEPH need to grow the body old school, instead of just growing it in a vat? How can something be so organic be so... artificial? Is this why my character is in the Corporate world, as a protector of his sibling who is basically the Jesus of AI?
Looking at the tables for this one, it seems that there are far too many benefits in education for me to leave it to chance, lest I veer too far from my concept. I think I will spend 1 LP to choose Scientific for this one to align it better to Decision Five. Here is the summary of changes:
Agility = 7
Awareness = 8 = 7+1
Brawn = 8 = 7+1
Coordination = 6 = 7-1
Intelligence = 11 = 7+1+1+2
Personality = 8 = 7+2-1
Willpower = 8 = 7+1
Survival (Awareness): E1
Pilot (Coordination): E1
Education (Intelligence): E1, F1
Medicine (Intelligence): E1, F1
Science (Intelligence): E1
Tech (Intelligence): E1
Lifestyle (Personality): E2
Persuade (Personality): E1, F1, Charismatic
Languages: German, SvalarNorse
Earnings: 2
Gear: Analytical Kit (with 5 reagents), Sensor Suite
LP: 3 - 1 = 2
This time, there are far too many table entries, but not a lot on effects so I will just roll with whatever I get. 1d6 = 2, and 1d20 = 4. This gets me:
A stranger visited your home and spoke in hushed tones with a family member. What did they talk about?
I now have a suggested character trait of shady past and an optional effect of having my family's surname being infamous with those "in the know." My social skill tests against anyone who knows about my sister's true nature has +2 complication! Nice.
******
So far, so good! I think the idea for the character is shaping up nicely. I still need to go through Decision Eight: Career and Decision Nine: Final Customisation - but both are fairly involved and as it happens, I need to go to bed for now. o___o
Inifnity's Lifepath System, Part Two
The basics: Infinity's chargen is called the Lifepath System, which is a set of 9 decision points that are mostly handled by random tables. However, you also get 5 life points (LP) that you can spend to forego rolling to instead choose at several points in the Lifepath. Right now, it sounds like I will have a minimum of 4 = 9 - 5 random choices, but there's an optional 12-point character creation option so I am probably missing something here.
At the start, I think it's a good idea to have a very vague idea about the character. Currently I think I would like to come in as an activist-type of character: Smart, well-read, but is capable of getting his hands dirty if needed. I imagine he will also be, as his 2018 ancestors would say, WOKE AF.
 |
| There's a PhilStar watermark, so I assume original image is from them. |
Decision One: Birth Host
The first thing I need to fgure out is to determine my character's natural capabilities - gifts that he is environmentally equipped with. All the attributes start at 7 (the human average), and I can lower a stat by 1 to increase a different stat by 1. Let's do that by dropping his Coordination to 6 and increasing his Brawn to 8. I can also spend LPs here to increase an attribute on a one-to-one basis up to a maximum of 10. (And already the 12 LP option thing makes sense.) I don't want to get crazy with my LP just yet, but I did want my character to be smart, so I will spend 1 to increase my character's Intelligence to 8:
Agility = 7
Awareness = 7
Brawn = 8 = 7+1
Coordination = 6 = 7-1
Intelligence = 8 = 7+1
Personality = 7
Willpower = 7
LP: 5 - 1 = 4
Next, I need to determine if he will have an alien heritage, which happens on a roll of 19-20 on a d20. I'd rather stay human for this one, and I'm willing to spend LP for that, but luckily for this choice, I can choose to spend after I roll. (Rolls.) A 14! That means my character is human.
Decision Two: Faction and Heritage
While I kind of want to be from one of the PanOceania worlds, owing to the fact that I have so far read about them the most, I am not so attached in this case, so I will just straight up roll my d20. (Rolls.) 12... Crap, that's a Corporation! How will I reconcile that with an activist? Did I eventually sell out, becoming a sort of Mr. Anderson?
Let's roll with it for now.
Also, when I roll a Corporation, I'm supposed to immediately reroll for my heritage. (Rolls.) 9! I am from PanOceania, after all.
Next, I will take my faction skills. As a Corp, my skills are Lifestyle and Persuade, so I get 1 rank of expertise for each of them. I also get to choose my first signature skill, and since Persuade is a much better fit for my concept than Lifestyle I will go for that. I gain 1 rank of focus in Persuade, as well as the first Persuade Talent, which is known as Charismatic - letting me reroll one d20 on any Persuade test.
Lifestyle (Personality): E1
Persuade (Personality): E1, F1, Charismatic
LP: 4
Quick aside: Attribute + expertise gives you the target number to score a hit, while rolling your focus or lower on a skill means you score an extra hit. So if I need to make a Persuade(Personality) skill test, at this point I need to roll an 8 = 7 (Personality) + 1 (Persuade) or lower on either of the 2d20 to score hits. But if I roll a 1 (my focus), I score two hits with that roll. Let's try that now. (Rolls 2d20.) A 6 and a 10! That's one hit for the six. had my 10 been a 1, it would have been three hits total, one for the 6 and two for the 1.
Decision Three: Homeworld/Homeland
Now I can determine my homeworld by rolling on the PanOceania table. (Rolls.) A 20, which gets me Svalarheima! I can choose English or German, plus SvalarNorse, for my languages. (Picking German.) I also increase my Willpower and Intelligence by 1 each, and gain 1 rank in Survival. This is my first rank in Survival, so it has to be spent on expertise and not on focus.
Agility = 7
Awareness = 7
Brawn = 8 = 7+1
Coordination = 6 = 7-1
Intelligence = 9 = 7+1+1
Personality = 7
Willpower = 8 = 7+1
Survival (Awareness): E1
Lifestyle (Personality): E1
Persuade (Personality): E1, F1, Charismatic
Languages: German, SvalarNorse
LP: 4
Decision Four: Status
Now it's time to decide how my character grew up. First up is social status, and here I want to spend LP to ensure to reinforce the idea that his early life wasn't too easy. I can choose to either be underclass or demogrant. Hmm... I like Demogrant better, which implies that my character's parents were living within the basic income guaranteed by the PanO government. It doesn't put him at rock-bottom, so it makes sense for him to somehow get tied to the Corporate life as an adult. But there is still enough INJUSTICE there to make him want to fight for something better.
Besides, demogrants give +1 Personality. and two of my skills use that already. Minmaxing, anyone?
Since I already spent a life point here, I can also choose my home environment instead of rolling. I can at least give my character a Happy Home, which grants him another +1 Personality and the Education skill.
Agility = 7
Awareness = 7
Brawn = 8 = 7+1
Coordination = 6 = 7-1
Intelligence = 9 = 7+1+1
Personality = 9 = 7+2
Willpower = 8 = 7+1
Survival (Awareness): E1
Education (Intelligence): E1
Lifestyle (Personality): E1
Persuade (Personality): E1, F1, Charismatic
Languages: German, SvalarNorse
Earnings: 2
LP: 4 - 1 = 3
Decision Five: Youth Event
Let's keep this one random. I need to roll 1d20 and 1d6! (Rolls) I got a 2 on the d20 and a 6 on the d6, which means... I witnessed a secret pregnancy. Huh.
I think I want this to be the pregnancy for a younger sibling. Borne of my mother, the body is actually an LHost for one of the ALEPH AI's aspects! (Think of an LHost as a body that has the subroutine of an Artificial Intelligence for a personality.) Why did ALEPH need to grow the body old school, instead of just growing it in a vat? How can something be so organic be so... artificial? Is this why my character is in the Corporate world, as a protector of his sibling who is basically the Jesus of AI?
 |
| Necromancer by Keith Thompson |
Decision Six: Education
Looking at the tables for this one, it seems that there are far too many benefits in education for me to leave it to chance, lest I veer too far from my concept. I think I will spend 1 LP to choose Scientific for this one to align it better to Decision Five. Here is the summary of changes:
Agility = 7
Awareness = 8 = 7+1
Brawn = 8 = 7+1
Coordination = 6 = 7-1
Intelligence = 11 = 7+1+1+2
Personality = 8 = 7+2-1
Willpower = 8 = 7+1
Survival (Awareness): E1
Pilot (Coordination): E1
Education (Intelligence): E1, F1
Medicine (Intelligence): E1, F1
Science (Intelligence): E1
Tech (Intelligence): E1
Lifestyle (Personality): E2
Persuade (Personality): E1, F1, Charismatic
Languages: German, SvalarNorse
Earnings: 2
Gear: Analytical Kit (with 5 reagents), Sensor Suite
LP: 3 - 1 = 2
Decision Seven: Adolescent Event
This time, there are far too many table entries, but not a lot on effects so I will just roll with whatever I get. 1d6 = 2, and 1d20 = 4. This gets me:
A stranger visited your home and spoke in hushed tones with a family member. What did they talk about?
I now have a suggested character trait of shady past and an optional effect of having my family's surname being infamous with those "in the know." My social skill tests against anyone who knows about my sister's true nature has +2 complication! Nice.
******
So far, so good! I think the idea for the character is shaping up nicely. I still need to go through Decision Eight: Career and Decision Nine: Final Customisation - but both are fairly involved and as it happens, I need to go to bed for now. o___o
Inifnity's Lifepath System, Part Two
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