Dark Runner Kaede Nisho

[Elva]

Its been awhile since I posted a character, but I had a good idea for one, so I figured I'd see what you guys with your expert opinions think. I kind of was inspired by Shadow Run and Mirror's Edge, as well i have a friend who does Par Cour(think that's how its spelled). Its an old character design I've had for awhile, but I thought it'd be fun to try her out like this. Hope you enjoy and any comments and critisism are welcome, as it has been ages since I've made a character of this quality. (note the blanks are for the name of my Inquisitor, whose name and concept I have yet to decide on, will fix once he's finished).


Kaede Nisho

History

Kaede Nisho was born on the forge world of Yaxong VI. Heavily industrial and urbanized, it is a world of technology and knowledge, even that which was forbidden. On Yaxong VI forbidden the technology trade flourished despite the Imperium's best efforts to stop it.  To avoid Imperial interference, the major crime syndicates hired local street children and gangers who knew short cuts and secret routes through abandoned areas to transport information, small tech pieces and collect payment.

Casualties amongst recruits was high, however a lucky few who survived made a decent living on their salaries. One such of these "Dark Runners" was Kaede Nisho. Armed with her Hellfury Pistol, an auto pistol capable of firing a limited amount of shotgun shells, she avoided the authorities and dealt with  clients if they attempted to stiff her employers. She walked a dangerous line being a freelancer, however she managed to avoid trouble.

Her preferable technique was to go on the rooftops, away from the ever increasingly patrolled tunnels and alleys. She grew quiet skilled, able to jump lengths that most would perish attempting. The Imperium could not even stop a street brat.

However, things changed. The Techpriests grew ever frustrated with their shrinking control over the world. They called in Inquisitor __________, who began hiss investigations immediately. Assisted by Enforcer Church, _________ found and exposed many of the hidden cults and criminal organizations, their members receiving their fate at the hands of the techpriests. The lucky ones died at the Inquisitor's hands.

It was during one such of these purgings, that Kaede managed to escape through a window in a high riser. A high altitude chase followed, the young delinquent constantly giving them the slip and almost getting away. Finally, she was cornered in an industrial site, where Church eagerly awaited orders to subdue or execute the suspect. But the Inquisitor had other ideas. Impressed by the stealth and grace that the youth showed. He offered her a pardon in exchange for a life of service. She shrugged and accepted with a characteristic "Meh.", she had nothing to loose.

Since the purging of Yaxong VI, Kaede has served Inquisitor __________ with her skills as a Dark Runner. She stalked and killed the corrupted preacher Dalos and ran fifteen kilometers with a request for reinforcements when communications where knocked out, saving the Ados moon from sure destruction.

Kaede has become one of _________'s most reliable charges, next to Enforcer Church.


Looks/ Physical Description

Kaede has short untamed black hair and wears a pair of ancient glasses to assist her vision. She has an ancient yet advanced bionic right arm that is decorated with artistic etchings of vines and leaves on the forearm. She wears mostly dark and well worn clothes to enhance her stealth. She is five foot nine and has brown eyes.


Personality/ Demeanor

Kaede is quiet and not very talkative, preferring to let her actions speak for her. She often crosses her arms when waiting and has a concentrated and focused look in her eyes. The Dark Runner is most at home on high elevations and even more so when moving from one to the other. When she talks, Kaede doesn't say more than necessary and has a mix of high and low Gothic in her accent. The only times she smiles is when she accomplishes a task, such as taking out a foe or another important objective.

Combat Gear and Style

Her Hellfury Pistol and a Knife. That is all the Runner claims to need apart from some specialty ammo and maybe a bit of padded armour. Her stealth and skill are more deadly than any heavy weapon or psychic power. She stalks her prey, sneaking up and slicing open vital organs and arteries. If her opponent is well armoured or tough, she peppers them with an armour-piercing round, and if things get tough, fires her one shot shotgun shell clip and flees to attempt from another angle. Her archeotech bionic arm can be a good stunning fist.

Quotes

"..."


Kaede Nisho

WS BS S   T   I     Wp  Sg Nv Ld
69  63  65 51  76   46  58  42  54

Right Handed

Equipment: Hellfury Pistol(auto pistol with a one shot shotgun round), knife, padded armour everywhere except head(armour value 2), 3 shot gun shells, 1 auto pistol clip, 1 Man stopper clip, average bionic arm, glasses(confer Night Sight ability when worn).  

Abilities

Lightning Reflexes, Catfall, Acrobatics.

[Morcus]

I like your back story. I like the use of a weapon thats like a modern LeMatt Revolver, I think thats pretty cool.

[O_o]

this has to be  the  best so  far  for  what  you  have  done  for  Kaede
Elva  you  have  finally  broken  from  your  mold of a repeating character archtype

make this a keeper

I  however only  have  two recommendations  

1. Use a  revolver instead of a auto pistol
      I feel it  would  work  better with the  idea of a AUX shotgun

2. Drop lighting  reflexes  for  acrobatics
      since  this  character  spent its  life  running and  jumping  across roofs  acrobatics is  more  suited  as it  adds to  jumping  across gaps  and  even  straight up OR  even  OVER people

[MarcoSkoll]

Have to agree with O_o. Any Parkour character should have Acrobatics!
If I were writing her, I might also be tempted to go rules that provided some protection against risky movement actions (normally, I allow the character to ignore a single 1 on their action dice for the purpose of risky actions).

I usually give characters with glasses the caveat that if they break or lose them, they suffer a penalty to WS, BS & I - the exact penalty depends on how bad their eyesight actually is. Whether glasses based misfortune has struck is up to the GM, of course.
(An exception to this is made for those vain characters who just wear glasses because they like how it looks.)

~~~~~

Sounds fair enough as background. I might reword the recruitment section a bit, as for my tastes the "Inquisitor captures their quarry, then offers them a job because they're impressed" story - while perfectly acceptable, and probably not all that uncommon (more than a few criminals will have skills the Inquisition could put to use) - sounds a bit funny if simplified to: "Want a job?" "Yeah, why not."

As an example, Inquisitor Rhodes recruited Maya Avens under a similar basis - but Lyra didn't actually attempt to recruit the psyker until a good while after capture, assessing Maya's character first. I have a half done short story about it, which I should really finish.

~~~~~

Also, one complaint... you've created a character called Kaede, and it's not (one of) the infamous Kaede Mack(s)? I'm disappointed.

[Flinty]

Very nicely thought out character and backstory - although I agree with Marco that the recruitment part needs some more thought. I'd imagine that despite Inquisitor ___________ , the lesser known elements of Martian Enforcement would be looking to make an example of any who dare to flout the rule of the Omnissiah's chosen....

I'd be tempted to keep the lightning reflexes but drop the Blademaster - is she really going to spend enough time training to be that good with her knife? I'd also consider adding Dodge, 4 skills may be a lot, but would reflect her general athleticism and ability to use the environment to close with someone without getting shot to bits.

I can see her using her parkour/acrobatic skills to out manouver opponents in close combat too, so I'd hope that roleplay and the GM would allow her to be a fairly formidable character with a knife even without blademaster - her WS is a respectable 69 after all.

[MarcoSkoll]

I'd also consider adding Dodge, 4 skills may be a lot, but would reflect her general athleticism and ability to use the environment to close with someone without getting shot to bits.

Dodge is one to be careful with - it can make the character a lot harder to hit than you may think. This isn't a bad choice of character for it - low T, little armour, an Initiative that isn't absolutely stellar, and a good justification in the background - so I wouldn't say no here, but there are other times when I'd steer clear and just roleplay with lots of the Evade action.

I can see her using her parkour/acrobatic skills to out manouver opponents in close combat too, so that  would allow her to be a fairly formidable character with a knife even without blademaster

Indeed. With such things as the backstab attack, and healthy use of the acrobatics skill to outfoot opponents, things should be pretty good.

If you do lose blademaster, you could add a bit back in by replacing the knife with a "Short Sword" - I regularly use that to represent a more sizeable blade.
(Ironically, I have used Artemis' "knife" for this on models. If you put that on a non-heroic scale human, then it doesn't look like just a normal knife.)

[Kaled]

Scale Terrain, or some variation, would probably be appropriate for this character.

[Elva]

I have an idea for the skills, maybe heroic, acrobatics and scale terrain would be the best, however I won't change them until I get a general consensus on what would be appropriate as I tend to be a poor judge skill wise.

For the back story I will do some revising, maybe following along the lines of Rhodes and Maya, if Marco has no issues with that.

Kaede Macks? I have a feeling that that's either horror stories about my entrance to Inquisitor or something to do with a quote I found in Dark Heresy by an Inquisitor of the same name.

Now that that's taken care of, YES! I can gloat now that I have created an awesome character. I am going to continue my streak with Enforcer Church next. But what I am really looking forward to is the brainstorming the rest of the warband. Elva may make the casting role as a guard vet, possibly under the name of Elli,(same design/concept, just different name).

Oh and I'm slightly disappointed no one noticed the funny quote

[MarcoSkoll]

I have an idea for the skills, maybe heroic, acrobatics and scale terrain would be the best

Heroic doesn't seem like what I'd give this sort of character.

Personally, I use Indiana Jones as a yardstick for heroic characters. If I can't imagine the character in something like that Desert Chase scene or some other "Never tell me the odds"* situation (well, at least trying, not necessarily succeeding), then they probably don't count.
*Yes, I do realise this quote is from a different Harrison Ford character.

For the back story I will do some revising, maybe following along the lines of Rhodes and Maya, if Marco has no issues with that.

I have no problem with that. Unless someone is shamelessly ripping off large portions of my work, I have no problem with people using the concepts or ideas in what I've done. After all, I've borrowed/stolen quite a lot of the ideas myself!

Kaede Macks?

No, it's all to do with the Contact cards at the last Spring Conclave, where at least three of the cards listed people all claiming to be "Kaede Mack". Of course, no-one knows who the real Kaede Mack is/was - or if it even matters. As a result, a few of the members have started creating their own Kaede Macks (well, I have a draft for one, at least).

Not appropriate for this Kaede, I have to admit, but a fun idea nonetheless.

Oh and I'm slightly disappointed no one noticed the funny quote

Well, nobody notices (or at least, says anything) when I put Pink Floyd lyrics into my backgrounds, so I'm not too surprised.

[Elva]

Okay, I was thinking of the Heroic skill because of its ability to reroll ones on action rolls.

Hehe, some of my best ideas have been from the back of cheap paperback novels at the used book stores. But after all, we carry the weight of the past.

That's kind of scary, considering that Kaede is one of my favorite characters, and my name happens to be MacK(well MacKinley, but you get the idea). I think I might have to jump on this band-wagon as well some time.

I'll have to look for those sometime. Oh wait, I just realized I don't know any Pink Floyd songs... (hangs his head in shame)

[MarcoSkoll]

Okay, I was thinking of the Heroic skill because of its ability to reroll ones on action rolls.

Possibly, but I prefer to use "Ignore the first 1 on their action rolls" for that - it's about the same effect on the chance of a risky action (re-rolling a 1 can be another 1, but it can also be a 6 that cancels a much worse fail), but without boosting the character's number of successful actions.

Oh wait, I just realized I don't know any Pink Floyd songs...

HERESY!

It's not always Pink Floyd though. Between backgrounds (usually in the quotes sections) and my storywriting, I've used lyrics from a lot of different bands.

In a similar vein, one thing I do occasionally is try to fit as much of a song into a forum post as possible (ideally without anyone noticing). One of my favourite attempts (not on this forum) was trying to fit The Beatles' "Strawberry Fields Forever" into a post about philosophy - the result was hilarious.

[Morcus]

Do you try and do it all in one post or over a few? It sounds like a great game.

[MarcoSkoll]

Do you try and do it all in one post or over a few?

Usually, as much as possible into one post without it being obvious. (As far as choosing the song, sometimes I just choose something, sometimes I randomise it - although it turns out to be German metal, I do "re-roll".)

It sounds like a great game.

Indeed. It's the discerning man's Rick Rolling.

Another example, quite possibly my best, was fitting the titles from every track on Joe Satriani's "Surfing with the Alien" into a post, in the order they appear on the album. I did cheat a bit by doing some of them phonetically, rather than letter-for-letter spellings (otherwise it would have been a bit too obvious), but the eponymous track was in there letter perfect. Nobody noticed.

[Elva]

Hehe, I'll have to try that as well now. I'll see if I can come up with a witty title for a special rule that follows those lines. As well, I'm a bit stumped on the glasses "skill"(I never you needed skill to have glasses ), do you have any suggestions for how it would work specifically?

[MarcoSkoll]

As well, I'm a bit stumped on the glasses "skill"(I never you needed skill to have glasses ), do you have any suggestions for how it would work specifically?

No, you don't have to have it, but it's a habit of mine to include negative traits when appropriate.

The best example of mine I can use is Arden Holf. His ageing eyes have got pretty bad, so he's at -20% to WS, BS & I if his glasses get lost or broken. However, depending on the exact problem with the character's eyesight, I might swap that round a bit. Someone who was long sighted (but with otherwise reasonable vision) might only take a penalty to WS.

It's usually up to the GM exactly when the character loses/breaks their glasses, but as a rough rule, we normally give it a 20% chance of happening if he falls, or takes a hit to the head. It's not the kind of thing you want to happen too often, else it gets pretty trite and really hinders the character.