OOC: Phere

[Phere]

Character Name: Phere
Rank: Seasoned 
Experience: 20 
Advances Left: 0
Race: Psi-Stalker
Concept: Former CS Psi-Stalker
Iconic Framework: MARS Merc Solider

Attributes
Agility d10
Smarts d10
Spirit d6
Strength d6
Vigor d8

Charisma: -2 with all but other psi-stalkers (Psi-Stalker), –4 if her cruel habits are known (Bloodthirsty), −4 Charisma with Simvan (Psi-Stalker)
Pace: 8 (d8 running die)
Parry: 7 (8 with Vibro-Blade Vambraces)
Toughness: 7 
   -Armored: 9 +10 Armor

Skills
Climbing (St) d6 (2) 
Driving (Ag) d4 (1)
Fighting (Ag) d10 (4)
Healing (Sm) d8 (1)
Intimidation (Sp) d6 (2)
Notice (Sm) d10 (2) 
Riding (Ag) d6 (0)
Shooting (Ag) d10 (4)
Stealth (Ag) d10 (4)
Streetwise (Sm) d6 (2)
Survival (Sm) d10 (2)
Swimming (Ag) d4 (1) 
Tracking (Sm) d10 (2)

Hindrances
Bloodthirsty (Major): Natural instinct for a wild psi-stalker that she still has difficulty controlling.
Loyal (Minor): As a second class citizen, true friends are rare and valuable.
Wanted (Minor): A fugitive from a Coalition State.

Edges
(Psi-Stalker) Ambidexterity: No off-hand penalty
(MARS) Killer Instinct: Wins ties on opposed rolls of any sort. If her skill die on an opposed skill roll is a 1, she can reroll it (but must keep the second result).
(MARS) Elan: +2 when spending a Benny on a Trait roll (including Soak rolls).
(F&G) Brawny: +1 Toughness. Load limit is 8 x Str in lbs (as opposed to the usual 5 x Str in lbs).
(HJ) Healer: +2 to all Healing rolls (including natural healing rolls for her own wounds), whether natural or magical in nature. She can give a +2 bonus to natural healing rolls to a maximum of five companions as well.
(HJ) Assassin: +2 to any damage roll where she strike a foe unawares (even with ranged attacks).
(Advance) Two-Fisted: When attacking with a weapon in each hand, she rolls each attack separately but ignores the multi-action penalty.
(Advance) Danger Sense: She can sense when something bad is about to happen. Anytime she’s about to be the victim of a surprise attack, ambush, or other nasty surprise, she gets a Notice roll at –2 just before the attack or event occurs. If successful, she knows something is about to happen and may take appropriate action against it. This means she is on Hold for the first round of a combat. Should she fail his roll, she still follows the normal Surprise rules, if applicable (see page 73).
 

Psi-Stalker Racial Traits
Ambidexterity: Psi- Stalkers have the Ambidextrous Edge.
Animal Empathy: Psi-Stalkers have an inherent empathy with animals. They start with Riding d6 and animals treat them as one of their own. This effect can be problematic if the animal in question is a territorial loner.
Fast: Psi-Stalkers have Pace +2 and increase their Running die by one die type (usually Pace 8 and d8 run die).
Outsider: Psi-Stalkers are creepy and off-putting, and make those with magic or psionic abilities especially nervous (for obvious reasons). They are barely more than a slave class in the Coalition and despised in the Federation of Magic. They suffer −2 Charisma with everyone except others of their kind.
Psychic Sense: Psi-Stalkers have the inherent ability to detect arcana, usable at will. They use the Notice skill to detect the presence and location of any psychic or magic energies, beings, or items. They can also use the Tracking skill to track a specific magical or psionic entity. This sense works to detect anything psychic, magic, or supernatural, including invisible and astral beings. Psychic Sense doesn’t work inside sealed armor or vehicles. Cybernetic implants also cause problems; every point of Strain imposes a −1 penalty when the Psi-Stalker uses his Psychic Sense (the Cyber-Psychic Alignment Edge can negate this penalty). See sidebar on the next page.
Psychic Vampire: Psi- Stalkers require a diet of PPE or ISP drained from living beings. They gain this using the Draining PPE/ ISP rules (page 121), which only works by touch. The Psi-Stalker must cut and draw blood from her intended victim or donor (which must be super naturally, magically, or psionically active to provide sustenance). Psi-Stalkers must consume at least 5 Power Points (PPE or ISP) a day or suffer Fatigue. They starve to death after a week of being Incapacitated by lack of “food.” Each 5 PPE/ISP drained restores one level of Fatigue. Consumed Power Points cannot be used to fuel spells or psionic powers.
Racial Enemy: Many Psi-Stalker and Simvan tribes have been at war for years. Meetings between the species start argumentative and get worse. Psi-Stalkers suffer −4 Charisma with Simvan.
Restricted Paths: Working arcane magic is impossible for Psi-Stalkers. They cannot take any Arcane Background using PPE, nor any Iconic Framework that includes it.
 

Gear
8,000 creds

Vibro-Blade Vambraces 
Damage: d6 Str+d8 MD 
Weight 8
Cost: 11,000 cr
Notes: AP 4, Mega Damage, Parry +1. Requires Agility d8, worn as a pair.

L-20 Pulse Rifle
Range: 25/50/100
Damage: 3d6+1
ROF 4
AP 2
Payload 40
Weight 7
Cost: 25,000 cr
Notes: Semi-Auto, 3RB

"New Style" Coalition Deadboy Armor
+2 toughness +10 armor
-* The helmet of his armor has exceptional embedded targeting enhancements, granting your hero +2 on all ranged attacks.
-* Extra high-density plating and other design factors grant +3 Armor to your hero’s starting armor

NG-S2 Survival Pack
    2 person tent, +20% water supplies
    Sleeping bag
    Flashlight w/knife; solar
    Inertial compass (+2 to Survival to navigate)
    Short range (5 mile) radio
    First aid kit (+1 to healing; 3 uses)
    Hunting/Fishing kit (+1 to Survival to forage)
    Three ‘saw wires’
    Fire starter
    Survival Knife, hatchet, wooden cross
    4 signal flares
    Climbing kit w/30 rope
    Soap and washcloth
    Canteen
    2 weeks rations

 

===
Iconic Framework (MARS - Merc Solider)
Roll 3 times on Fortune and Glory Table
Roll 3 times on Hero's Journey
Gain +5 skill points
Select any two weapons of choice from Close Combat and/or Ranged Weapons—Personal. If one of the choices is grenades, take an assortment of eight of any type.
Begin with any one Body Armor, an NG-S2 Survival Pack and 3d6 × 1,000 credits

 

Fortune & Glory
2 = Strong Armor: New Style CS Deadboy +2 toughness, +7 armor, full environment; +2 mods from HJ Body Armor table
5 = Smart and Learned: (+1d Smarts, 3 Smarts skills at 1d6)
7 = Strong and Powerful: Your hero adds one die type to Strength and begins with the Brawny Edge.

Hero’s Journey
Education
3 – 4 = Your character is a talented medic and a huge boon for any group she runs with. She has the Healer Edge and the Healing skill at d6.

Training
1– 3 = After serving in a military, paramilitary, militia, or security force for some time, your hero has some solid combat training. She gains +5 Skill Points, which may be spent on Fighting, Shooting, or Throwing in any combination.

Underworld & Black Ops
18 = There are many killers in the world, but your character is a wetwork expert with a particular set of skills. She gains the Assassin Edge. She also gains +2 for Fighting, Shooting, and Throwing rolls, but only to offset Called Shot penalties.
 

Skill Points
15 (Base)
+ 5 (MARS Merc Solider)
+ 5 for any combination of Fighting, Shooting and Throwing (HJ)
+ d6 Healing (HJ)
+ d6 in any three Smarts skills [Notice, Survival, Tracking] (F&G)
+ d6 Riding (Psi-stalker)
+ 1d in two skills below their Attribute [Climbing, Intimidation] (Advance) 

Advances
(Psi-Stalker) Ambidexterity
(Major Hindrance) +1d Agility
(Minor Hindrance x2) +1d Smarts
(MARS) Killer Instinct
(MARS) Elan
(F&G) Healer
(F&G) Assassin
(5 xp) +1d to Vigor
(10xp) +1d to 2 skills below Att [Climbing, Intimidation]
(15xp) Danger Sense
(20xp) Two-Fisted

 

Background
Phere was a 'wild' psi-stalker, orphaned as a child, but that did not stop her from surviving. A CS patrol came across the resourceful (and rather tenacious) pre-teen, and deemed her young enough that she could still be 'civilized' and be of use to the CS. They captured her and took her in to begin her education. She resented the CS for taking her from her home, but she was no fool and being ever the survivor, she quickly realized playing along with the CS was her best bet.

Her natural talents for survival and killing were deemed to be of more military value, so she was enlisted into Psi-Battalion and given a team of dogboys to work with, and a partner to help rein in her killer tendencies and interrogate her quarry, from time to time. They even taught her detailed medicine, though it was meant to make her a more effective killer, she often used it to care for her dogboys, tending to their wounds herself since the CS saw them largely as expendable. To her they were anything but expendable.

Over time she found it to not be so bad. She always had plenty to 'eat' and she loved her pack of dogboys; Bubba, Rufus, Laddie, Rowdy and Oliver. The pack loved her right back too. And her partner, Squidge (though she went by a different name at the time) actually treated her with respect and courtesy, which was rare since as a psi-stalker she was a second class citizen at best, and psychics tended to be on edge around her. Over the years their friendship developed and along with her dogboy pack, they became a rather effective team.  

Squidge's interrogations began to bring her doubts, which she shared with her psi-stalker friend, causing them both to reconsider the CS, and their place in it.

And then the war started.

The campaign and siege against Tolkeen was brutal. Phere did her part, but toward the end she saw just what the CS thought of her, her dogboy pack and Squidge. When it came down to it, they were fodder. Her pack was wiped out in a foolhardy mission and Phere was nearly killed herself. Both sides were desperate and were doing anything to win. It wasn't even a war anymore. It was just... one atrocity after another. Squidge decided...she couldn't stop the war, but that didn't mean she had to fight in it, and Phere stuck by her friend. Together they went AWOL, trying to leave their demons and nightmares of what they had seen, been through and done behind them.

Once away from the Coalition, she adopted a nickname in place of her given name, just like Squidge, and they looked for a good place to lay low until the Coalition forgot about them, or hopefully assumed them KIA. Together, they found their way to a little place called Prince's Landing.

Along the way though, they came across an old, wounded bobcat caught in a crude trap. It was missing an eye and was badly scarred from a long, hard life in the wilderness. Phere freed the bobcat, tended to its wounds and fed the animal before they set off on their way again. The bobcat followed her afterwards, and so she adopted it. He is nothing but a surly ball of fangs and claws with others, looking at at them like he is plotting their demise and in general being a mean, old bobcat. Strangely enough, with Phere though, he is all purrs and cuddles, which causes her to dismiss any stories of his surly demeanor. The only exception is Squidge, who he barely, grudgingly tolerates, but even she is cautious around the animal.

 

Phere and Squidge