Boomtown: Character Generation

Some early notes on character generation:




Starting Skill Points

Most NPC characters will have 3-5 skill points worth of skills, altogether.
This means they'll tend to know little beyond a single specialized
trade, with which they make their living. Player characters are the
"larger than life" heroes and villains of the Old West, and they have
12 skill points, when starting their characters.

It costs 1 skill point for each rank you want in a skill. To become a journeyman
(rank 3) in a trade skill, for example, you must spend 3 skill points
on that skill. However, purchasing the 5th rank of skill (making you a
Master of that skill) costs 2 skill points instead of 1.

Note that if you want to be a business owner, about half your starting skill
points will be going toward the Merchant skill and one other skill most
relevant to the trade.

Guidelines for Skills

In my opinion, rugged Wild West frontiersman are like iconic batman
superheroes. Your whole life is normal and great until you have ONE BAD
DAY that changes your life and leads you down a completely different
path. I recommend spending half your points in a way that best
represents your old life, and the other half to represent how you've
been getting by for awhile now. This gives everyone a sort of contrary
"history" to reveal at their leisure.


Skills & Trades

Skills each govern a special kind of activity, industry, or business, and
represent your overall knowledge over that field of enterprise and your
capacity for accomplishing that kind of work.

If you work for somebody else, you can earn a basic weekly wage of $4 plus $2 per skill rank one one single skill most relevant to your profession. If you are
a supervisor or manager person, you may add your Merchant skill to this
trade skill to determine your wage. If you work for another player, you
can negotiate any wage you want with that player. If you work in a
hazardous profession, your pay might be 5%-20% higher based on the
risks of the profession.

If you are in business for yourselves and use your own labor for the business, you don't earn a basic wage but earn income based on your business' income.

It is recommended that you take 3 ranks of any trade skill in which you want
to be considered a professional. A fully certified doctor, for example,
should have at least 3 ranks of Medicine. Anything lower, and he'd be
an assistant who helps the doctors. Ranks of 4 or higher are unusual,
and tend to mark someone as uniquely skilled in that trade.

Businesses regularly require labor for production and service, and your skill rank
in a relevant trade skill determines how much labor you can contribute
to the business. Labor is only a useful value to you if you are a
business owner, otherwise you are instead concerned with your weekly
wage.

Skill 1: ........Apprentice - Produces 1 Labor per day or earns $6/week
Skill 2: Skilled Apprentice - Produces 2 Labor per day or earns $8/week
Skill 3: .......Journeyman - Produced 4 Labor per day or earns $10/week
Skill 4: Skilled Tradesman - Produces 6 Labor per day or earns $12/week
Skill 5: Master Tradesman - Produces 10 Labor per day or earns $14/week

The Toughness skill is a special trade skill which can substitute for many
other types of trade skills involving manual labor such as Forestry,
Farming, etc. Each two ranks of Toughness skill can substitute for 1
rank of any other trade skill involving manual labor, but you may not
add these "substitute" ranks to your existing skill if you have any.
(You may use them instead, however.)

The Education skill is a special trade skill that works like Toughness, except only applies to skills involving mental acuity, memorization, articulate speech, and,
of course, education. Each two ranks of Education can substitute for
one rank of any of these trade skills, such as Court Law or Medicine.

Possessing these two special trade skills means you may earn less money than a
dedicated professional, but you'll always be able to find work somewhere.

Trade skills:

Artist -- painters, sculptors
Animal Husbandry -- ranchers, slaughterers, dairy hands
Burglary -- swindlers and thieves, rascals, ne'er-do-wells
Carpenter -- carpenters, wheelwrights, cabinet makers
Carousing -- politicians, bartenders, waitresses, salesmen, swindlers, entertainers
Clothworking -- weaving, sewing, working a loom
Construction -- architects, engineers, shipwrights, surveyors
Cooking -- cooks, brewers, bakers, butchers, even bartenders
Court Law - lawyers, judges, slippery business folks
Farming -- farmers, field preparers,
Forestry -- loggers, woodcutters
Gambling -- professionals plying their trade in dangerous art
Glassblowing -- glass makers, bottlers, dairy hands
Horsemanship -- rodeo cowboys, horse trainers, grooms
Hunting -- hunters, scouts, trappers, fishermen, cattle drivers, mustangers
Jeweler - gemcutter, watch repairer, eye glass makers
Languages -- writers, linguists, translators, telegraph operators
Leatherworking -- hatmakers, bootmakers, etc.
Mason -- stonewrights
Medicine -- doctors, pharmacists, surgeons, medics
Metallurgy -- metallurgists, metal purifiers, ore processors
Mining -- gold miners, iron miners, etc. including prospectors and panhandlers
Navigation -- navigators, ship captains, boat operators
Performance -- singing, dancing, playing musical instruments, storytelling, entertaining
Smithing -- blacksmiths, silversmiths, coppersmiths, etc.
Teaching -- teachers, trainers, philosophers, motivational speakers
Teamster -- muleskinner, wagon driver, cattle drover, packers
Writing -- authors, poets, reporters, editors


Special Trade Skills:

Merchant
-- supervise workers, run a business. Adds to an existing trade skill
to determine income. This also helps you to gain funds to startup a
business and provides discounts on purchasing premium land.

Education -- Each 2 ranks may substitute for 1 rank of cerebral trade skills to determine labor or income.
Can be applied to: Artist, Cooking, Court Law, Gambling, Jeweler, Languages, Medicine, Navigation, Teaching, Writing.

Toughness -- Each 2 ranks may substitute for 1 rank of physical trade skills to determine labor or income.
Can be applied to: Carpenter, Construction, Farming, Forestry, Horsemanship, Mason, Metallurgy, Mining, Smithing, Survival

Inherent Skills
Every player character is assumed to have certain inherent skills that are
not quantified. They can usually read and write, unless the player
chooses otherwise. They can survive out in the wilderness, they can
ride a horse, and they can shoot. Most have a borderline predanatural
sense for danger, and almost all are quickdraws to some degree. They
tend to know a lot about various major towns, including all those
role-played on these forums, and tend at least have heard of most of
the other players.

Starting Cash
Trade skills also determine your starting cash when generating your character.
All characters start with $25. In addition, your character has $50 for each
rank of trade skill relevant to his profession, plus $25 for each rank
of Toughness or Education (but not both).

Starting a Business
If your character owns a business, he starts with $250 "credit" to setup
that business, plus an additional $200 credit for each rank of Merchant
skill your character has. You must have at least 3 ranks in a skill
relevant to that business' main operation.

Most empty land outside the city or within the frontier can be purchased for $50 per
acre, but isn't generally productive unless you do something with it.
It generally costs $200 to setup a field, mine, ranch, lumber camp,
shop, house, sawmill, or similar construction on an acre of empty land.
Players may instead hire other players to perform these services
cheaper, or utilize the "construction recipes" to purchase these
improvements using tools, materials, and labor.

For each rank of Merchant a player starts the game with, he may purchase "premium
land" for $100. Additional "premium land" costs $250. Premium land is:

• 1 acre of land in the city limits, complete with permits to begin your own construction
  

• 1 acre of land in the city limits, with a small residential home or warehouse already built.
  

• 1 acre of land in the frontier perfect for logging
  

• 1 acre of land in the frontier perfect for mining
  

• 1 acre of land in the frontier where gold or oil has been discovered
  

• 1 acre of fields prepared in the frontier for growing crops, trees, fruits, or whatever else you may want to plant
  

• 5 acres of empty land out in the frontier