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Old 05-29-2021, 10:30 PM   #5
Tymathee
 
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Default Re: [DF] A Portal Fantasy within a Dungeon Fantasy: Where's Alice?

Part 2

Designer’s Notes

Here is my first draft of Alice’s stats, sans equipment loadout that I can hem and haw about later. Conceptually it only makes sense that our dungeon-fantasified Alice have at least some nods to the original source material, which I made sure to include. I cannibalized the “Seventh Son” template to build her stats as I saw fit.

For a fantastically competent child fitting for DF, she has mostly good primary attributes. At some later point I will stat-up the Vorpal Blade (sans the sentient part, but with the usual abilities plus more) for her to have that will likely more than compensate for her lackluster damage. Hmm… say, she just happens upon it while on the run through Dungeonland before she is taken into the palace. I will have to modify some scenes with T. Diumm and T. Deeous in The Land Beyond the Magic Mirror though since that is where the Vorpal Blade is found normally, but that should not be difficult.

For secondary characteristics, she is small and fast, two good things to have if you have little to no protection in the form of armor. At least how I’ve envisioned it so far her father had taken her to a trip to “Town” and she was only equipped with what you would expect for a day trip to the market, then got in a spat with her father which led to her running off just as the party of PCs happen to be nearby for the father to ask them to collect her (he’s a jerk and has a lot of disposable money to throw at adventurers for petty things).

For advantages, most notably I will talk about Rapier Wit and her Ridiculous Luck… and the absence of Serendipity.

Rapier Wit because I figure our dungeon-fantasified Alice has quite the sharp silver-tongue, with skill in making witty insults that sound like she might have repurposed local children’s limericks for. The skill Public Speaking (Repartee) is interesting in that it is specifically just for insulting… intended to be used in place of regular Public Speaking. Seems fair, right?

Ridiculous Luck has the Game Time modifier which I will have convert to a 1 for 1 ratio. She can use her Ridiculous Luck every ten minutes in game time., which will let her use her Ridiculous Luck once per 30 in-game minutes (Edited as of 5/31/21. See later posts for relevant context).

I felt conflicted about Serendipity. I’ve no real empirical evidence to back this but from what I observe is that to some extent GMs, consciously or not, will have “Serendipity X [0]” for all the PCs as a campaign switch turned on for the typical game in the form of “convenient coincidences” as the GM has a soft bias for the players. For my campaign, to some extent I have got scripted sequences in mind like the previously mentioned bit of how the PCs just happen to catch up just in time for Alice’s trial at the palace. Even though she is an NPC it feels awkward to have her pay points for something the PCs get for free. Granted those serendipitous moments are wholly at my discretion because otherwise they should almost feel like the world is out to get them and there is no guarantee of happy coincidences. I know, harsh, but I am trying to invoke that kind of atmosphere with my style of dungeon crawl fantasy. Alice will have the same sparse amount of Serendipity as the PCs get for free, as in what I think is convenient to nudge the plot in the right direction.

I kept her Disadvantages compact, just enough to get that feeling of “this is Alice” which I did not think needed the full -50 for. Callous is much less “uncaring sociopath” and much more “self-absorbed child”; “… she frequently shows unkindness in her conversations with the animals in Wonderland, takes violent action against the character Bill the Lizard by kicking him into the air, and reflects her social upbringing in her lack of sensitivity and impolite replies.” (a quote pulled from her Wikipedia page)

She has got a pretty good swath of skills suited for helping her survive the wilds of Dungeonland. It would seem implausible for a real seven-year-old to have such skill, but we are talking about a fantastically competent child that is somehow capable of surviving Dungeonland, where pretty much everything is inevitably out to kill you.

Last edited by Tymathee; 05-31-2021 at 05:54 PM. Reason: Update regarding Game Time modifier.
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