High Concept and Trouble

Character creation in Fate has two main phases. In the first you define your character with two Aspects, a High Concept, a Trouble, and a name. The High Concept is central theme of the character. It says who they are and what they do. Trouble is just that, a persistent problem, either stemming from the character or its circumstances. In a group game the players would pick these out, but as our players are phantom players, we are going lean into Mythic to define most of them. I have been so intrigued by the mystery of Player 3 I have decided to take him over as the primary character. Who doesn't love a good mystery?  

The second main part of the character creation processes is the Phase Trio. In this part you take a character and put it in a dangerous or adventurous situation, then two other characters will be involved in its development and its resolution. That will be show in depth in the next article.

Because I am letting Mythic do the inspiration for the characters of Players 1 and 2, I start by generating a few of random word pairs. Just enough to launch the imagination.

Description: Combatively Powerful
Background: War Humble
Skills: Mechanical Intelligent
Personality: Humble Angry

I had intended this for Player One's character (PC1), this feels more like Player 2's interest, so lets start with that character.

Character creation is part of world building, and the words "Combatively Powerful" put me in mind of dangerous animals. We have an illness that changes people into feral animal hybrids, so on the fly I decide that in addition to the High Concept and Trouble, we should have a one word Animal Aspect at character creation. Thinking of animals that are combatively powerful I decide on Bear. Because i like bears, and I know more about them than I do Tigers. 

Moving back to the High Concept, we can see Humble comes up a lot, and we have War and Mechanically Intelligent as well. Lastly we have Anger as part of the personality. 

Lets try this on for size for the Hight Concept and Trouble.

Name: Martin Owen (Private)
High Concept: Humble mercenary tech specialist infected in the line of duty.
This HC tells us he has a military back ground, he is good at building or repairing things, and how he was infected, which is a pivotal moment for all the characters. 

Trouble: Likely to throw the first punch. 
I had considered "Short Tempered", but this gives us a bit of guidance as to a lovely problem that will cause a lot of trouble. 

Animal Aspect; Bear

Getting back to PC1 I make a snap decision that I want something very different for his Animal Aspect, so I decide on Rat. The word pairs give us the rest.
Appearance: Aromatic Eyewear
Description: Very Empty
Abilities: Natural Environment
Traits and Flaws: Weaponless

I stopped there because an image popped into my mind of a sneaky but skillful scout who avoids using noisy guns, is always hungry and never gains a pound, who always looks scruffy and dirty and wears an old pair of night vision goggles around his neck at all times. A truly ratty individual.

Name: Private "Ratty" Stan Wilburn
High Concept:  Sneaky mercenary scout who is at home in the dark,

Trouble: Insatiable appetite for all of life's pleasures

Animal Aspect: Rat

Lastly we get to our mystery man. So now lets build PC3. I am taking him over as my PC, but that doesn't mean I can't use some inspiration.
Appearance: Hairy Eyewear
Animal Actions: Follow Mysteriously (Wolf maybe?)
Army Descriptions: Skilled Lacking
Plot Twist: Repeat Unknown

I added Army Description, because the other two were mercs, and I decided that they were all three part of the same squad. I like Wolf as an Animal Aspect because he is community minded, and I want to build him up as an investigator and that is similar to a good hunter. Hairy is a good one, because it could show how far his illness has progressed. 

Here we are looking at three mercenaries that where were cut off from help during in a mission to curb a pack of the feral changed. Two were bitten, and picked up the illness, but the third was uninjured and not only has started showing symptoms, but they seem to be developing faster. 

Name: Lt. Lewis Brian
High Concept: Mercenary Field Forensic Scientist who will turn over every rock for answers

For trouble I thought about focusing on the fact he is slipping towards feral faster, but that is more of a big plot aspect for him and isn't very actionable for Evoking. Still, I feel I can extract from his illness and personality a good trouble.

Trouble: Will take any risk to find a cure

Animal Aspect: Wolf

These three Aspects will be Evoked to produce Fate Points, which is a bit beyond the scope of this series. Check out Fate Core Chapter 4 for more details. Drivethru RPG: Fate Core PWYW

The next step is the Phase Trio, where we get a slice of adventure for our trio of characters, develop more aspects.

W.D.