While I have played the FASA Doctor Who RPG many, many years ago. I have not had the chance to play Cubicle 7’s entry into the Doctor Who game universe. So this will be an introduction to the game for me. I picked up the book from a local game store a year ago and I also had a chance to get a lot of the PDF books in one of the charity bundle sales. I’ve also noticed that a lot of fans are homebrewing their own “publications” for this game with unofficial “Expanded Universe” sourcebooks. This gives me a little bit of hope and inspiration as I’d like to do this with other universes (Star Trek in particular). So I knew that I had to make an entry into the Character Creation Challenge with this game.
Since I made a Gallifreyan Time Lord with the FASA system, I think I’ll make a companion with this game. Tim Bronson was originally a police officer in a small city when he got caught up in some business with a mysterious stranger, some weird alien looking things and some para-military group that claimed they were working with the United Nations. Turns out, they were working with the UN and they all helped to stop a group of aliens from harvesting Human body parts for some intergalactic medical black market. The mysterious stranger, called The Baron, put in a good word with UNIT’s commanding officers. Upon this recommendation, they invited Bronson to join them in their quest to keep the Earth safe from the aliens that wish to harm the planet and it’s occupants. Sometimes he’s with a team heading off planet, other times he’s helping The Baron with some urgent tasks. But he’s been running ever since that fateful day.
The character creation system assigns you points to build a character. They can be spent on Attributes, Skills and Traits. The attributes are Awareness, Coordination, Ingenuity, Presence, Resolve and Strength. They have a score range from 1 to 6 in each attribute. For a law enforcement character I selected the following. Awareness: 4, Coordination: 3, Ingenuity: 3, Presence: 2, Resolve: 3 and Strength: 3. The Traits that Bronson had (which also pulled from the same pool of character points as attributes) was Brave, Lucky, Keen Senses (sight), Voice of Authority (aka The Policeman’s Voice), Quick Reflexes and Friend (all of his buddies back in the police force). There were a few other traits that were intriguing (including some bad traits that would have gained me points) but I decided not to go overboard on the character.
There are twelve skills listed. Each skill can also have an Area of Expertise (but they cost points to put into them). So I selected the following for my police officer turned UNIT operative. Bronson’s area of expertise was Interrogation (trying to get information out of a suspicious person). The Stuff section basically stated to select what you thought your character should have. So I picked a few things that a former police officer may still have in his possession and called it good. Here is the character sheet.
Afterthoughts:
I liked the detailed explanation of the attributes. Ingenuity-3 represents this, Strenght-1 represents this, etc. It detailed what an average Human would have for statistics which, I think, helped players create their characters. This level of detail also went into the Traits and Skills.
I also liked that the end of the character creation process was noted in the book. Usually a character creation process just pushes you into the next chapter, then the next and so on. There were times I was wondering “Am I done or did I miss something?” Especially when I would see blank spots on the character sheet. I usually had to go look up the index to find the section to fill in that part of the sheet.
I really had to resist the urge to pull the other books out and check out what they had listed for stats and information. I may have to do that soon, especially the fan made stuff.
Additional Notes:
Dealing with a malfunctioning furnace made me wonder if I was going to be able to get a character made today. Luckily we were able to get a temporary fix going until we can get a professional in to look at the system. I really dislike the winter and the cold weather. I’ll take the heat of summer anytime.
Coming Up Next:
Dungeons and Dragons 4th Edition