Let's Create a Character in Stonetop
Imagine a system that guides you through creating an interesting, playable character, one who is unique and whom you actually want to play. Welcome to Stonetop!
About Stonetop
What is Stonetop?
A TTRPG about home and the lengths you'll go to protect it and the people you love who live there.
This is a PbtA (Powered by the Apocalypse) game created by Jeremy Strandberg, in which a group of heroes from the village of Stonetop venture out into the world on adventures.
Why Stonetop?
Stonetop expertly combines the fun of OSR gaming with elements of problem-solving, linear and gradual progression, and high (but fair) lethality, alongside the more narrative aspects of PbtA games, such as co-creation, highly personal stakes, and a high degree of player expression through the many character sheets.
Learning everything this game has to offer, though, is a challenge, with over 1,200 pages across its two books.
Fortunately, this is offset by how well the books are laid out. The first 100 pages contain everything you need to start playing, including all the rules you'll use most often during play and instructions on how to get the game started. Then, another 50 pages introduce all the playbooks and explain their respective sheets.
From there, the manual takes a very deep dive into the system, explaining what every single move means, what it does, how to adjudicate it, what the GM can do, and everything else in great detail.
For instance, the Recover move is explained in detail on page 245, with an entire page covering each tier of success or failure, followed by another full page containing an in-game example of how the move works.
Creating the character
Here, you'll follow the creation of Wynfor, a problem child who takes care of sheep, with a heart full of love and anger.
The game has many interesting playbooks. Some include unique magical artifacts, while others come with an entire group of followers. They're all unique and distinct.
My two favorites are The Seeker, the playbook of a curious scholar who roams the world in search of arcane artifacts and knowledge, and The Would-be Hero, the playbook of an underdog who grows in power and eventually becomes a true hero.
For simplicity's sake, I'll create a Would-be Hero, since The Seeker requires choosing Minor and Major Arcanas, which add a lot of information to the system.
Choosing a Background
Each playbook has three backgrounds that help give your character flavor. The options for the Would-be Hero are:
- Impetuous Youth: The troublesome kid who's always getting into trouble. You can push your luck, but there are always consequences.
- Driven: Something happened to you that made you very focused and eager to answer the call to adventure. You can spend XP to improve your rolls.
- Destined: You've been chosen to defy great danger and achieve greatness. You cannot die until you fulfill your destiny.
I really dislike Driven and the idea of spending XP, which isn't easy to earn, to improve rolls by such small margins.
I really like Destined and all the shenanigans it allows. Since you can't die, you can take all sorts of risks, which helps you accomplish amazing things.
But I love Impetuous Youth and how it allows you to succeed where you would otherwise fail, doing so in a way that pushes the story forward.
I pick Impetuous Youth!
Choosing an Instinct
An Instinct is something your character does without even thinking, and whenever you bring it into play, you earn XP as a reward.
You can create your own, but the default options are: Defiance, Doubt, Earnestness, Optimism, and Sacrifice.
Since I'm a troublemaker, I think Optimism is a great first choice because it allows the character to grow and change his mind, or maybe double down on his ideals further down the line.
Choosing Appearance
Stonetop provides plenty of options to help you create your character, while still allowing you to come up with your own details.
For this character, I'll choose:
Still a child, earnest voice, thick, soulful eyes.
So, a 13-year-old child, a bit bigger than most kids, honest, and big-eyed. Cool!
Choosing Place of Origin and Name
Stonetop has a huge list of appropriate names for each of the world's regions. Although you can use any name you want, sticking to the guidelines set by the game helps create a more flavorful and consistent world.
My character will be born and raised in Stonetop, with no tragic history. He's just a kid who likes danger for some reason. His name is Wynfor.
Choosing Stats
Each playbook has certain values it can assign to its stats, some positive and some negative, which gradually improve throughout the game.
The Would-be Hero starts out as the weakest character, but has the potential to advance much further than the others through play.
He starts with one +1, four 0s, and one -1.
Stonetop uses the classic six D&D ability scores: Strength, Dexterity, Intelligence, Wisdom, Constitution, and Charisma.
Why is this boy so hard to keep out of trouble? I think I'll take an unexpected approach and make him particularly smart and curious, so he goes out of his way to investigate things, putting himself (and others) in danger. He's also a bit chubby and thicker than average, which makes him clumsy.
His +1 goes into Intelligence, and his -1 goes into Dexterity.
Choosing Moves
Every playbook in Stonetop has a number of unique moves that you start with and can add to your character later.
Most of the customization after character creation happens here, as you choose new and interesting moves that your character can use during play.
Starting Moves
We start with two moves: Anger Is a Gift and Potential for Greatness.
Anger Is a Gift is interesting because it introduces a new resource for your character to track: Resolve. You gain this by roleplaying your character well, based on the choices you make during character creation. I love games that offer clear rewards for roleplaying, especially when they're something players will actually want to use.
On the other hand, Potential for Greatness makes you excited to roll the dice and trigger other moves. It makes your character more powerful simply by rolling well, and you can quickly become a powerhouse for the team.
Choosing Moves
The Would-be Hero can choose two additional moves.
I won't go over all the options; I'll just talk a bit about the ones I've chosen.
I want him to be resilient and particularly frustrating to fight against. He's a gritty kid who doesn't give up, which is why I'll pick I Get Knocked Down and its "evolution," But I Get Up Again.
Picking both of these makes the character harder to kill and allows him to face powerful monsters with much less risk. He knows how to take a fall and get back up again, fearlessly standing up to evil.
Choosing Special Possessions
Every Stonetop character has Special Possessions. These represent their role in the Stonetop community, what they can do during downtime, and what knowledge they have readily available.
I'll choose A Good Dog and Husbandry Tools.
These will represent his family: they'll be farmers, and Wynfor takes care of the animals alongside his loyal dog.
He often leaves his work unattended to explore the area around Stonetop, bringing his dog along. However, he's very protective of his sheep, and has even fought monsters by himself to protect them.
Fear & Anger
Each playbook has specific questions to answer in order to provide more context about your character and help you deal with certain situations involving your mechanics.
For the Would-be Hero, we have to choose the things he fears and the things that make him angry.
I'll answer these questions and make my choices.
What do you fear most?
- The death of your family or loved ones.
- What you're capable of.
What makes you burn with righteous anger?
- Wanton cruelty and unnecessary suffering.
- Violence against children, animals, and the innocent.
- Threats to your loved ones.
When did your fear or anger last cause you trouble?
When a sheep from our farm was stolen by the Crimwin, and we heard it being tortured in the forest.
What did you do?
I ran into the forest, my heart full of anger, and didn't stop until I found those three Crimwins.
How did it turn out?
I killed them with my bare hands, with the help of my dog, Bilo.
They almost killed Bilo and me. The villagers had to find us in the forest later and bring us home.
Introduction
Character creation is complete! This last part allows you to introduce your character to your fellow players and explain who you are, who the people around you are, who you care about, and so on.
Introduce yourself
"I am Wynfor, he/him. I am an Impetuous Youth, born and raised in Stonetop. I am young and thick, with hopeful, soulful eyes."
Describe your Special Possession
I have a dog named Bilo, and together we take care of the village's sheep, as well as other animals whenever necessary.
Tell us your Fear & Anger
I fear death and losing the people I love, especially after my sister died during the winter. I also fear what I'm capable of when I'm angry.
I get angry when people are cruel, and I'll never stay silent when I see it happening. I also get angry when people hurt the innocent. Some of the village's kids used to throw rocks at the sheep, and I ended up hurting them.
Answer one of the following
This part allows you to create NPCs from your character's life. Each player creates one in turn, until nobody wants to create anyone else.
Whose heart do you hope to win?
Neasa, the daughter of another farmer, calms the storm inside my heart.
Who is counting on you?
My parents, Siwan and Caradoc, had me very late in life, and they count on me to handle the harder tasks.
Who understands the path you are on?
The village tanner, Dafyd, is one of the few adults who really listens to me. He knows about my rage towards evil, and says I'll be great one day.
Ask your fellow PCs one of these
This part allows you to show interest in other people's characters and ask them to elaborate. You'll also have the opportunity to answer some questions about your own character.
I'll skip these, since they focus on relationships between characters.
Conclusion
Well, this is a lot, but the process is very guided and easy to follow. There are some big choices, like the playbook itself and the starting moves, but otherwise, there are just a lot of small and interesting decisions.
Still, this is why this system requires an entire session for creating characters, developing the village, and deciding what the first adventure will be about. It takes time, but creates a very robust starting point.
I love systems such as OSE and Mothership, in which character creation is fast and simple, taking no more than 10 minutes.
However, creating a complex character with deep connections to other characters, NPCs, and the world itself is very interesting and allows you to feel immersed in the world more quickly.
This also gives the GM more material to work with at the table.
While creating this character, I felt really compelled to learn more and more about him, to discover what else I would learn along the way. This shows how compelling this character creation structure is. As soon as I finished, I was eager to play him and see his story unfold. I might even play some solo sessions with him, just so I don't lose this character.
I think this is very powerful and very important for an RPG: making players genuinely motivated to play the characters they've created.
I hope that when I GM this game, people will feel as connected to their characters as I did to mine.