Holy crap I made it. I was able to get 31 characters made for the 2025 #CharacterCreationChallenge. The last character was officially done on March 14th, but I rolled up (well mostly) 31 characters using 31 different systems. Thank you for sticking with me and for cheering me on until I made it to the finish line. I had several of you reach out to me after reading my SitRep Report towards the beginning of February. A few more real life issues came and kicked me hard. After several vet visits, overnight stays and stressful financial burdens, one of our younger beloved cats unfortunately crossed the rainbow bridge. This had devastating mental and financial issues (vet bills) that the family is still working through. On top of that, the real world issues of government shutdowns and layoffs has been adding to my stress. I also wanted to make sure that my gamemaster commitments for SaltCON-Spring 2025 were fulfilled, which I gladly did so. Especially since I was receiving two admission passes for myself and my geek wife.
OK, enough real world bitching. What are my final thoughts on the 2025 challenge? (Why do I suddenly feel like Jerry Springer at the end of one of his shows?) While this was probably the most challenging of the five years I’ve been doing this, I’m still really glad that I did it. I’m even more glad that I stuck with it and made 31 characters. I think one of the bad things that happened after January 31st is that I let a lot of distractions (most legit) get in the way of me completing the last few characters. During January I’m in “go go go” mode. Taking a lot of time to make sure a daily post is made and uploaded. Once that urgency was gone, I had to focus on real life sacrificing play time. For those of you who can post significant daily content on your blogs, I salute you.
The entries that stood out to me in the 2025 challenge included Star Trek Adventures 2nd Edition, Planet of the Apes and Red Dwarf The Roleplaying Game. All three of these books were beautiful, the character creation process was easily explained and I want to homebrew for all three of them. Look forward to more from me on these games.
The games that were disappointments in this challenge were actually quite limited. While there were a few that were frustrating, I wouldn’t really call them disappointments, with one exception. The Strange. It started out with so much high potential, then crashed hard. The feedback I had received from that blog post has already been documented in the “additional notes” sections of other entries, but it was from people who had similar experiences that I encountered with this RPG.
Speaking of feedback, I really want to thank the publishers/authors of the GI Joe RPG and Shadow Ops RPG for providing feedback to my blog posts. This tells me that they loved working on their projects and were grateful to their customers. I’m hopeful that my feedback will help improve future publications/editions of their works.
Also, the TardisCaptain dot Com Discord server during this challenge. Even now we are still having some regular conversations on a variety of subjects. For those of you who have joined me there, thank you.
Here is my 2025 list of characters:
Day 1: Star Trek Adventures 2nd Edition Character: Keman Less
Day 2: Sword of Cepheus Character: Harrik Stol
Day 3: Traveller 2nd Edition (Mongoose) Character: Denton Wilkinson
Day 4: Castles and Crusades Reforged Character: Barakas Nimblebarrel
Day 5: Doctors and Daleks Character: Vrogg
Day 6: Basic Roleplaying Character: Jacob Green
Day 7: Everyday Heroes Character: Alex Carter
Day 8: Dark Places & Demogorgons Character: Kenneth Manchester
Day 9: Fantasy Age 2nd Edition Character: Harsk Redaxe
Day 10: See You Space Cowboy Character: Mortimer Point
Day 11: Terra Primate Character: Caleb
Day 12: Star Wars Edge of the Empire Character: Corvo Sturig
Day 13: Tales of the Valiant Character: Gunnbawk
Day 14: Stars Without Number Character: Zan Camrin
Day 15: Shadow Ops Character: Mason Gordon
Day 16: Barbarians of the Ruined Earth Character: HLPR-47
Day 17: The Witcher Character: Styd Ralart
Day 18: Traveller The New Era Character: Jarl Barkton
Day 19: OGL Wild West Character: William Keetley
Day 20: Cyberpunk 2020 Character: Xenos
Day 21: Old School Essentials Character: Thamar
Day 22: GI Joe Character: Spacebar
Day 23: No Day To Die Character: Daniel Knight
Day 24: Metamorphosis Alpha 1st Edition Character: Drixxian
Day 25: Twilight 2000 2nd Edition Character: Blaine Dawson
Day 26: The Strange Failed to make a character
Day 27: For Gold & Glory Character: Marcus Dexius Arcavius
Day 28: Planet of the Apes Character: Flint
Day 29: Red Dwarf Character: Carl Stark
Day 30: Mazes & Minotaurs Character: Flavius Antius Tiribius
Day 31: Iron Kingdoms Character: Blackadder
For all of those who are still reading my little corner of the internet, thank you. For all of those who reached out to me or came up to me in person to give me a hug, thank you. The friendships and camaraderie of the geek and gaming community has really been a rock that has helped stabilize my life right now. If you made it to 31 days, congratulations. Send me a note via email (carl (at) tardiscaptain.com) on the TardisCaptain dot Com Discord server. I want to make sure you got the completion graphic for completing the challenge.
Also, if you purchased anything after clicking on the affiliate links to DriveThruRPG or Amazon, thank you. I’m not doing this blog to make money, but the kickback helps when making game purchases for future challenges.
This article is open for discussion on the TardisCaptain dot Com Discord server. You can also email me at Carl (at) TardisCaptain.com or click on my social media links with any comments.