So I’ve recently developed an interest in taking another run at an old game that I was enamored with long ago. “Arcanum: Of Steamworks and Magic Obscura“. Arcanum has a very unusual setting as CRPGs go – in an analog of Victorian England that has transitioned from a typical medieval fantasy past to an industrial steampunk present. Characters have an “affinity” between 100% Magick and 100% Technology, and where you are on the spectrum determines how you interact with anything magical or technological in the game. Archmages are forbidden to travel on trains. Traditional elves dislike dwarves for a *reason* – their very presence interferes with spells and enchantments. And the interaction of race, background, stats and such with dialog in Arcanum is second to none.
Name: Cassandra Carter
Race: Half-Orc
Background: Sickly (offsets a lot of the half-orc’s physical advantages for increased intelligence)
Skills: Pick Locks, Melee, Stealth, Persuasion
Cass hasn’t led the easiest of lives. She was born in Caladon to an Orcish mother working as a cook and a Human father working as a coal miner. Her mother was quite unusual for an Orc – both far more intelligent and far more frail than usual for the species. Her father was similarly an odd duck – taken with her mother explicitly for her intelligence despite his family’s disdain for “the savage”.
Unfortunately, her father died in a mining accident when she was quite young, and her mother took a position as a maid-servant for an eccentric local woman – the Lady Anabella Clementine – to keep a roof over their heads. Lady Anabella insisted that Cass get a “proper education”, and hired private tutors when local schools would not accept a half-orc student. Her Mother died young – even by Orc standards – as a result of her frail nature. But Lady Anabella kept Cass on as a ward and paid to finish her education. Lady Anabella was never a warm and caring woman. In many ways she was demanding and unrelenting. But she was also fiercely independent-minded and determined to instill the same in Cass.
Cass inherited her mother’s keen mind, and while not nearly as frail as her mother still grew up thin and gangly rather than solid and muscular as a typical half-orc. Having few friends, but access to Lady Anabella’s library, she is astoundingly well-read. But her true passion was crime novels. She has always imagined herself as a detective, and as a result has developed skills in picking locks, sneaking, self-defence, and a variety of more esoteric scientific subjects.
When she came of age, Cass dreamed of working as a private investigator. But it soon became clear that there was little call for that profession in their provincial town. So when the opportunity arose Lady Anabella bought her a ticket to Tarant on the maiden voyage of the IFS Zephyr – the first lighter-than-air commercial vehicle in the world. In Tarant Cass hopes for both a new start, and for opportunities befitting her talents.
Author’s Notes:
Cassandra will fall somewhere in the middle on the magic/science scale… perhaps leaning more towards science. She’ll use whatever tools seem appropriate for the job – which may make things a little harder for her in the endgame as she gets few of the advantages of specializing. She’s also going to have issues with most races in Arcanum being quite prejudiced against half-orcs. So it will be more of a challenge for her to talk her way through things than it would be for many others.
I’m still settling on an art style for this, as I don’t quite have enough credits in OpenAI to go nuts experimenting.
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