So as much as I love to give my thoughts on creating characters, I felt it would be interesting to actually go through the creation of an original character (a.k.a an OC) for a game I like. So here is the basic and simplified process that went into creating my OC for the miniatures game Malifaux.
Part 1 - The Idea
So things had not gone well for me after the collapse of Warhammer Fantasy and for a while I thought I'd just give up on the hobby. It was then I stumbled on a metal miniature for a game called Malifaux. It was a greenskin called a Gremlin, a LaCroix. Thus, I delved into the world of Malifaux.
Gremlins was my faction and the more I read the more I liked them. Greenskins who were a mix of the Hillbillies stereotype and cowboys. They were about booze, banjos and guns. Having started collecting and playing, I really wanted to do battle reports. The idea came of an individual who would introduce the games in the form of a story format. A banjo playing, story telling Gremlin. Despite writing a few ideas down, this part never got off the ground due to not being able to really draw and colour characters, but the idea still remained.
Part 2 - The RPG
Wanting to learn more about the world of Malifaux, I purchased the RPG players manual, a game called Through the Breach. While being a humans point of view, it still gave me ideas thanks to it's classes (called Pursuits) and it's skills and talents section.
I gave my Gremlin character more focus on areas like music (banjo), social skills like bewitch and convince with more survival areas like evade. The Performer pursuit was more to his style as a musician and story teller. A traveler who has seen things, been places and is always ready to tell others about it (even if they don't want to hear it). But he still wasn't done, still didn't feel right.
Part 3 - Into the Bayou
Given things hadn't gotten too far and the battle report idea was now pushed back to just an idea, progress on the character stopped. That all changed with the release of the RPG expansion 'Into the Bayou', a Gremlin themed add-on. The information was exactly what I needed for this character. New traits, an advanced pursuit called a Virtuoso who debuffed/buffed much like a Bard through music (a goal for my character to achieve to), but best of all was the family names. Each Gremlin belonged to a family and it was basically their last name. It was your allegiance and what your family was like was going to help shape you growing up.
Up until this point my character had simply been referred to as 'The Narrator', the one who told the stories. With this new character creation, I flipped the cards and let fate decide. As a result, a few finer details emerged.
- His name was Dimitri Benois. The Benois family were between the Joneses and the LaCroix families, but also near one of the human towns too. From this I had it that Dimitri had learned an equal amount of his music knowledge from them as he had his own kind.
- He had drawn the Magical Conduit talent from the Conflict talent section, meaning positive magic buffs on him would also heal, but took extra damage from offensive magic. I had pictured his in his younger days walking into magical ruins and experiencing an event that would change him (something he refuses to speak about to this day).
- His fate once flipped stated:
- The moon whispers secrets in silver light
- and you will rise above the vile crowd below
- the rapids sweep you from the path
- If you hold him back
- and the eyes in the darkness will change you
Not sure what it all means, but there are some dark aspects to his fate.
He's not strong and not very cunning, but he is very charming and somewhat tenacious. Has alright speed too.
- Having set when he learned what skills at what times, I built his background on this and above. This was the brief story of his past:
Growing up, Dimitri wasn't the strongest of his siblings and wasn't much of a trouble maker either. Despite this, he rarely got into trouble as while he might have appeared to be an easy target to place the blame on when his siblings caused trouble, his way with words seem to convince the elders of his innocence. Some grew jealous of him, while others found him charming. That said, he was adventurous and would love to explore places when trips were made. One such little adventure had a more permanent effect on him, though what happened to him, Dimitri will not say. He had a fascination with the sounds of the banjo and the stories told by others.
As he grew older, Dimitri began interacting more with the Humans and learned much about their way of life and their music. He soon found his natural talent with the banjo drew more attention and that he was able to duel with the best of them. Practicing more and more, he could pluck the strings faster then most and was well noted for making the pace of a dance to go faster and faster, leaving them exhausted by its end. He would travel across the land, see many things and would return to the Bayou with stories of both adventure and action. His skills with both instrument and words had the ladies flirting with him and the guys offering him booze. Any normal Gremlin might have been content with this lifestyle, but Dimitri felt something different, as if a calling to be elsewhere. Fate had plans for Dimitri, though what they were was something he did not know.....yet.
Personality wise, Dimitri comes off as both positive and optimistic, yet he hides a number of secrets. He tends to not talk much about his past and certainly such a hidden event in it might explain why he is quick to stand in defense of the swamp hag Zoraida and is always willing to help her without asking for anything in return (it's hinted that she rescued him from that something which was responsible for his 'Magical Conduit' conflict talent). While he seems to appear fine on the outside, a keen ear can pick up his true emotions through his music, a passion of Dimitri's.
A veteran of a number of scruff ups, Dimitri always has a tale to tell and loves nothing more then recalling a conflict he saw or was in, with the occasional exaggeration to improve the excitement of a story, though he will never outright lie or deceive his listeners with cruel falsehoods (he respects his audience too much for that). He tends to encourage his fellow Gremlins to have fun and tends to flirt with a local lass or two, though he doesn't seem to have anyone in particular to focus on (though he has admitted that it's more down to finding someone who is more a kindred spirit then just simply hooking up with a cute girl).
In a fight, Dimitri isn't so much a coward as he is just very cautious. He knows he isn't much of a fighter, but isn't the type to simply run away and leave others to their fate. After all, how is he to tell the latest tale of his recent encounters if he isn't there to see it. If anything, his banjo is his greatest weapon because once he starts plucking those strings and the speed increases, his music can have a devastating effect.
- The future of Dimitri would be shaped by plans I had, but there was still some things that needed to be done before he was ready.
Part 4 - The Design
With the character in full swing, now was the time to start planning the design. I felt the best way was to start with the designing of a miniature. As luck would have it, the next wave was herald by the arrival of the newest book, Ripples of Fate. In this book came a set of miniatures I had longed for, the Banjonista (banjo playing Gremlins). The idea was simple, take the male banjo player, replace his head and green-stuff some extras. The only problem was a) the Banjonista were not yet released and b) I had not yet picked a head to be the replacement. For the head I had a few options, the first being that of a Bayou Gremlin while another was Burt Jebson, but converted with a more closed jaw and converted hat. I did have a spare Bayou Gremlin, but when I went looking for him, he had vanished. So at this point, there was some thinking to do.
Months later (cause things happen in life that tend to drag me away from these things) and something occurred to me, I can't play as Dimitri in a game of Through the Breach. I had advanced the character so far in creating it and moving his story forward that he has evolved to be more of a story driven NPC then an actual player character. This is where Maurice comes in to help solve the design problem. It was from this revelation that I decided to create a second character to use for if I ever got to play the game, one who had some information preset, yet still be enough of a blank slate to still need things like the creation flips to set him up (which is why he has no family name yet). What was determined was that he would be a Boozer with the occasional time spent as a Pugilist. As such, there was a perfect model to represent that, a Bayou Gremlin who is ready for a fist fight with a jug of moonshine on him. It is this model I have decided to use, swapping the head with the Banjonista (when they come out) with some green stuff and a few Warhammer Empire troop booze bottles thrown in. This would be the set up for the basic design for both of these characters.
Stage 1
Sadly, that plan didn't go the way I'd wanted it to go. While I did find that missing Gremlin, my original idea was sort of scrapped when I realised that the heads of the various plastic Gremlins were not of the same size. As such, I decided to keep the head of the current Banjonista (I wasn't too keen on the beard, but what can you do) and use one of the Bayou Gremlin hats as I felt a famous banjo player like himself needs a big hat to show his importance. The ears needed to be worked on slowly, heating up some pliers and bending them several times to fit more into place with the hat. My plan was to green stuff some hair and a coat, possibly some sort of foot wear. However, I still needed ideas for a base and a paint scheme. I didn't need to look too far for the latter.
Turns out one day I started humming a song and wondering where I had last heard it. Turns out it was from this classic gem of a movie:
This movie is a comedy about a country boy living on his families apple farm in Tasmania. His name is Albert Einstein and his famous mass-energy equivalence formula is what put bubbles into beer, but also ends up creating an atomic bomb. Yes, it is an incredibly silly movie, but one I do enjoy. As such, the plan will now take some inspiration from his clothing (he does have a hat and coat also in the movie) and I may even make a few modifications to his banjo, though I am unsure if I could pull off a decent enough conversion on it to make it a good reference. Unsure if I should paint the pants similar to his main clothing (as seen here on the poster) or the jeans like riding pants he used when horse riding (which would blend more with the usual Gremlin clothing).
To Be Continued...
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