Creating Player Characters

A roleplaying game typically needs player characters, and Warped World is no exception. Character creation is an opportunity to give life to the character concepts players hold in their heads. The creation process follows a few simple steps:

Pick a character background
Decide proficiencies
Assign stat dice
Create character info and backstory

That’s all there is to it! Don’t worry though, we will go into more detail in a moment. But first, a note: Warped World is designed to be fairly flexible and loose with its character creation in order to allow for a lot of wiggle-room with your character’s backstory and how they are played. Warped World’s core motive is to trust the player and GM to collaboratively navigate the narrative that is being created, and allows for a high degree of freedom in regards to the mechanics that control character creation and interaction.

Pick a Character Background

Field agent? Thaumatologist? Researcher? There are a handful of pre-made character backgrounds available in Warped World, and if none of them suit your fancy, you can even create you own. A character's background describes the archetypal role they fill within the narrative, but is not necessarily related to their actual current job, motive, or desires. Backgrounds provide pre-set options for proficiencies and modifiers to allow for quicker character creation. In Warped World, there are 5 backgrounds already created for you to use, they are:

Researcher: A scientist, academic, or other knowledge-focussed background that emphasizes leveraging learned knowledge and discovering new information about the world.
Field Agent: A person of action rather than research, field agent is an action-oriented background.
Thaumatologist: A magician, by another name. A background focussed on the use of the anomalous.
Reality Bender: Able to twist the world around them, reality bender backgrounds focus on manipulation of bothe people and the world.
Anartist: Traditional art can be boring; art that causes a fire storm is anything but. The anartist background focuses on the creation of anomalous objects.

Decide Proficiencies

Once you have a background picked out, you will be able to select 2 proficiencies from the listed options. A proficiency is a particular special strength the character has as a result of their background, and gives a mechanical bonus of an added D4 on rolls that relate to that proficiency. We will go into more detail on how proficiencies work later, but for now keep in mind that the description for a given proficiency isn't a hard boundary on what it does and doesn't relate to. Consider it more of an example. Each background also has a selected modifier, representing a particular stat which gets a +2 on all rolls involving that stat.

Example

Olive's character Jason Jackson is a reality bender with proficiencies that are focussed on anomalously aided speech and deception interactions. Based on the Reality Bender background provided by Warped World, there are a few options for proficiencies which can help with this concept. After considering what the character's history, motivations, and behavior; Olive selects Deception and Social Manipulation, and Impersonation and Transformation. There are other proficiency options which also fit the mold, but due to Jason's moonlighting as a covert agent for the Serpent's Hand, Olive decides that these specific selections fit the narrative function of the character best.

Assign Stat Dice

Warped world uses a stat dice system. When building your character, you will assign one of each of the following dice to each stat, representing your character's relative strength in that area. Don't worry, a low stat dice doesn't mean implicit failure. Exploding dice allows for exciting and unexpected success on even the weakest of a character's stats.

Stat	Example Related Checks
Research	knowledge, history, science, logic, and reasoning
Procedure	tinkering, crafting, hacking, lock picking, non-combat skills
Containment	fighting, shooting, athletics, combat skills
Diplomacy	speech, deception, social grace
Anomaly	thaumatology workings, reality bending, anomalous and magical actions

Die	Relative Strength
D4	This is a weak point for the character. They are not highly adept in this regard, and may not be able to pass anything but the easiest possible check.
D6	This is a below-average stat for the character. They may struggle with more intermediate or advanced difficulty tasks related to this stat.
D8	This is an average stat for the character. They can generally do things related to this stat, but will struggle with particularly challenging tasks.
D12	This is an above-average stat for the character. They are fairly adept at tasks related to this stat, but may still struggle with more advanced tasks.
D20	This is an excellent stat for the character. They are highly adept with the stat, and will find most tasks related to it relatively easy to complete.

Character Information and Backstory

Now's the time to flesh out your character! Give them a name, describe what they look like and give them some backstory so the other players and the GM can learn a bit about who they are as a person. Consider how their backstory might influence their behavior through the game. Warped World relies heavily on collaborative narrative creation, and your character's backstory will help shape that narrative and their experience through it. You may consider adding some of your character's personal weaknesses and motivations in the "Notes" section of the player sheet. This does not have a strict mechanical effect, but can serve as a reference point for play through the game's events.

Alternate Setup Options