STEAL THIS CHARACTER: Scumbag, Criminal, and Violently Youthful

I'm gonna give you guys a character to steal for your home games. They can be a PC, NPC, Inspo, bbeg, a myth, or whatever. It's just good and I'm having fun playing them so, I am going to be a cutie pie good boy and share him with friends.

IN THIS ARTICLE YOU WILL RECEIVE, FOR FREE:

• Essentially his session 0 backstory

• Some fun npcs in their life

• Ways to tie this character to others in your games

• The inspiration for this character (hints: network tv, a book by the author of fight club, and a single YouTube video from 2015?)

• Some things to explore with this character

• Some ways to RP as this character

That's worth your time right?

CHARACTER INSPIRATION: The spectrum of Old Charlatan to Young Scumbag

Old Charlatan:

At this point in my life the show I was watching for myself was The Sopranos and the show I was watching with my girlfriend was Once Upon a Time. Great shows to combine into a character. I went with Christopher from The Sopranos and Mr. Gold from OUT as my benchmarks and ripped art from a French video game called "Last Fight" for the character "Mr. Coldkane", who looks like the hardest m*********** of all time.

See? Credit 2014??? or 2015 Smosh Games for having like 1 video where they played this game. I've never forgotten that powder blue devil. Now, I am him. Except instead of a tiefling I made him a satyr in 5e cause of the advantage on saving throws. MIN MAXERS are CA-YOOT!

Okay so with the cool art (the most important part ofc) and 2 different character directions, I was ready to kinda make this guy real. If I was gonna go the more Mr. Gold route, my idea was to take every summoning spell in 5e as essentially my build and have my thing be that I'm never alone. That way, I can be a sketchy guy who always has backup and play with the paranoia of never wanting to be alone. This guy would be a smooth talker, charlatan who made deals with extra planar beings in order to always be able to harm whoever was pissing him off. Doesn't matter if it's a king, some scary badass, or whatever. My guy was gonna know somebody who could help, and what they wanted in return.

He was gonna wear suits, furs, Cartier buffs. The whole thing was gonna be slick and like Ric Flair and early 00's Rock.

Young Scumbag:

Then there was the Christopher side of the idea, just some fucking entertaining scumbag who wants to be as big deal and is mentored by a boss of a an organized crime group (ALLEGEDLY, YOUR HONOR). this guy was gonna have similar drip, with a little bit of younger flair like a wifepleaser under a suit for example, and maybe a chain. Still using Coldkane as the inspiration because it doesn't go harder than that when it comes to character art.

As I developed this character and Danny and I linked our backstories, it made sense for the younger angle to be how I built this guy. I had also just read Adjustment Day by Chuck Palahnuik, which talks about the violence of stifled and directionless youth looking for some creed to follow for a better life when civilized behavior seems to only help old, greedy, and boring people. It's a dense, disturbing, and smart book. My guy was not gonna be too smart though. Or rather, too educated. I didn't want him to be poor though, because I wanted a tension for him to be that "well violence may not solve all problems, but smacking someone upside the f****** head and stealing their wallet has gotten me a lot of cool s***". For my guy, I wanted it to be his job and education that crime does in fact pay, and it can pay a lot.

Plus, I thought since the book focused a lot on young people having the character that would eventually be named Ice, be young, blunt, macho peacock of a man would help set the stage immediately that there's an intensity to youthfulness and desire for control that makes crime feel like the most exhilarating way to get power, money, and status. Those that don't are like cattle, and the ones who are willing to live outside the bounds of normal rules are the ones in charge of reaping the benefits of the herd.

NPCS & Details:

I made it so Ice grew up rich in a coal town, and his dad was a doctor, but on the side he was the guy criminals came to after hours for care. Thus, ensuring that Ice (short for Isosceles) and his sister Suzie (short for Scalene cause triangles are pointy and I wanted Ice and his sister's name to sound kinda upper-class, but not posh and have a visual kind of jagged violence to it) grew up in a mcmansion. Danny's character was gonna be his like forray into traveling the world as a full time wheelin' dealin' stealin' savage on hooves. Oh yeah, I thought tiefling was too on the nose so I made him a Satyr, a light blue satyr. Cause Ice has gotta be blue.

For class, I did combination warlock bard because I want to fight my dm weekly.

SO, to recap and expedite the details:

• Ice looks fly as f***

• His older sister is a genius that invented bubblegum and is off at school at some fantasy bulls**** equivalent of like MIT

• His dad/ mom/ parents/ whatever is/are crooked doctor/s who defends their practice by arguing that healthcare is right and that everyone regardless of their occupation should be able to get care. (Progressive king?)

• Charisma build cause loudmouth youth gets annoying quickly if they're pea-cocking is not able to benefit the party mechanically and socially

• Get cool art, obscure YouTube video optional

• The Sopranos influences how he talks

Actually Playing this Character:

I like to think about the themes or questions my character plays with, cause I'm a dork. Like, what are they a response to? So, using Ice as an example, I had just read or been reading Chuck Palahnuik's Adjustment Day and a setting point for that book is how young men in great numbers when they feel as though they have no opportunities, that is a pressure cooker for political and societal change, for better or worse.

So, I wanted to take the trope of the troublemaker kid in the small town who wants to get out and make a name for themself (Gambit voice) and change the yearning for like a bustling terse intensity of cocksure and cussing. This was gonna be a guy who thought they were the brains, beauty, and potential brawn of the operation, but when it came down to it, wild card is not the right word, think like, escalating showboat of a person. They're predictable, in that, they're here to stunt. How they stunt, may just add a level of "for f***'s sake" for the other pcs while the players are laughing. (Don't be a spotlight hog, check in with your table).

So how do I play Ice? I get in the mindset of mimicking Ric Flair promos, add in some lil quirks like his cover for being a traveling thief was being the wardrobe guy for a circus because he's excellent at sewing, and attempt to illicit boisterous emotions from my fellow players. Youth is fun, youth can be violent, so for a character like Ice even when things get serious; I try to make him be violently fun to be around.

STEAL MY CHARACTER!