Character Creation Challenge 30: Cold City

This story game about trust, treason, and secrets is set in Berlin in 1950. The Second World War finished five years ago, and the Cold War has just begun as the Allied forces are split into East and West. But the capital of the former Third Reich is still rife with secrets left behind by the Nazi regime. Just like in real history, the victors are scrambling to lay their hands on research made by German scientists. Unlike real history, in this game, these secrets include occult and weird super-science gadgets, weapons, and horrors. Ostensibly, the Allied Forces are collaborating in keeping peace in Berlin, and the joint Reserve Police Agency is responsible for handling weird and occult stuff left behind in ruined labs and underground bunkers. PCs are members of the RPA’s multinational teams, all sworn to cooperate, and all answering to their respective national governments. It‘s like a cross between the cold war thriller The Third Man and the Hellboy and BPRD comics.

Creating PCs for Cold City is supposed to be done in collaboration with the group, but for the sake of the Character Creation Challenge, I will do the steps I can do without input from GM or other players. First off, I choose nationality (USSR), occupation (military medic), and invent some details regarding my PC’s background and how they ended up in the RPA. Then I spend 5 points on the three attributes (each starts at 1). Next step is to invent five traits (talents, gifts, quirks), three positive and two negative. Then, I create hidden agendas, one national and one personal. 

And then, we run into the steps requiring other players. A central part of Cold City is the PCs’ relations with each other in their RPA team, what they think of each other, and how much they trust one another. Trust is measured with a numerical value for each of the other PCs in the team, from 0 to 5. Team members can get bonuses to die rolls, so everyone profits from the high trust as long as the team works together, but when someone betrays another team member the traitor receives a bonus based on how much they were trusted. Therefore, let’s say there is another PC, one Major Digby Bassett-Wright.

Name: Dmitry Petrovich

Nationality: USSR

Occupation: Soviet Red Army Medic

Background: Grew up in a kolkhoz in western Russian Socialist Soviet Republic. Wanted to study to become a doctor. As the war began he was drafted into the Red Army, given a basic education as a medic, and sent away to the front. 

Draw: Petrovich was the sole survivor of an incident during the last weeks of the war in Europe when soviet troops entering Berlin were attacked by a strange luminescent inhuman entity. Because of this experience, he was considered qualified for this mission.

Attributes: Action 2, Influence 2, Reason 4

Traits: Cool and steady under stress (+), Perceptive (+), Accurate marksman (+), Brusque manners (-), Perhaps too curious about all things scientific (-)

Hidden agendas, National: Secure any research data concerning enhancing the performance of the human organism.

Hidden agendas, Personal: Find out what happened to his friend Alexei Mikhailov who went missing during that encounter with the inhuman entity.

Languages: Russian, German

Trust & Opinions: Major Digby Bassett-Wright, British imperialist, stiff-backed and with an air of superiority. My trust: 2, Their trust: 1.

Equipment: Uniform, id-papers, pistol, medic kit.