Characters

When the story is told in the Shadows of the Past, the important people are
all characters. Most of the rules of the game are related to the characters,
and the most important characters, the player characters, are each
controlled by one player.
The game always starts with making player characters. It is important
to go through this step together so that players can get excited about each
other's characters and participate in creating the basic blocks of the
game. Good characters are interesting to all players, not just their creator.

Basics of character creation

The game director has reserved character forms for this very purpose, on
which the players enter the information of their characters. Character
creation is a free form of work, where ideas are exchanged, discussed and
rejected outright. Each player progresses at his own pace in choosing
different aspects of the character, sometimes the rubber goes when the
player reconsiders his character.
However, when creating characters for the first time, it may be wisest
for the game director to lead the conversation, and the characters are taken
through the following steps together; this way, nothing is left undone and
the characters are completed in approximately the same distance!
Some other games recommend that players design their characters as
perfectly as possible before starting the game, but not here; it's better if
just enough is known about the character to start the story. Surely the
author doesn't assume that the audience already knows the main character
of the story, right?

The seed of greatness

What kind of hero is your character? You probably already have some idea
of ​what your character is like: what he looks like, how he behaves, who he
knows. Now tell me what makes him a hero.
Each player briefly tells the others what kind of heroism more than
anything else reflects the character's character. Did he run away from the
elevators across the wilderness as a child? Did she turn the prince from his
chosen path with her song? Was he the one who sank the infamous fleet or
saved the king's life with his herbal knowledge?
And it hasn't been said that the character's heroism has already been
done! The player can decide to tell an act that he hopes his character will
do sometime in the future. Maybe that's what the story is about!
Once you know your character's feat, you can choose their first
ability. Abilities are the character's skills, learned and internal. Examples
of abilities include sailing, tracking, sword fighting, and oratory. Some
abilities are special and not accessible to everyone, such as the past lives
of the elves or the special bamboo weapons of the ammenites. However,
most are ones that each character can learn if the player so
chooses. Examples can be found on page 146.
Whatever your character's heroic deed was, his first ability is based
on that deed: if he healed the king, maybe it's the medicine skill. If he
killed a large beast, it could be a spear. The doctrine of God may come
into play if your character is destined to be a great prophet.
 After choosing the first ability for your character, mark it on the
character sheet with the value experienced. The five levels of abilities are
unskilled (0), skilled (1), experienced (2), master (3) and grandmaster
(4). In his first ability, your character is already more skilled than most
others: a character with the ability alone is already skilled enough for most
places, and even if your character isn't a master, he's still close!

More about talents

Once the character's first ability is listed, it's easy to come up with
more. Can this guy survive the night on the porch? Has he ever sailed with
pirates? What has gotten into his head from the convent school?
The player chooses three abilities for his character at a level capable
of reflecting the character's previous experience and the aspects the player
wants to focus on. The purpose is not to map the entire previous personal
history of the character, but to pick the raisins from the bun; these are the
most interesting facts about our hero.
The player can also record as many abilities as he wants at the
unskilled level. These are also helpful, as they tell about the character's
background and experiences. These background abilities can be added
later, as the character is always considered to know the abilities typical of
his culture.

Passive Abilities
When the player is otherwise satisfied with his character's abilities, he
chooses three more abilities: the so-called passive abilities are common to
all characters and a little special in that they are, as the name suggests,
completely passive. No matter where the story goes, the character can
never use passive abilities to initiate events, only to survive them and
defend the character. Passive abilities are:

Durability (pure)
This is the character's ability to continue the journey with determination
despite pain and fatigue. It is used to test the limits of the character's body
and condition.

reaction (instinct)
This is used to measure the cleverness of the character's body and
thoughts. It's about avoiding a rock slide as well as a quick response to an
insult.

Resistance (Sense)
This is about the character's willpower, which withstands both social,
physical and magical threats without wavering from its purpose.

The player values ​the passive abilities according to what kind of image he
has of his character: one of them is level experienced, one capable and the
least skilled.

Segregation of resources
At this point, we already know what the player character can do; he is
capable of heroic deeds and skilled in many skills. Next we set the
character's resources: these are the internal resources that the character
uses when trying to be serious. The player can use resources during the
game to make the character succeed in tougher situations than usual. There
are three types of resources: purity, instinct and reason.
Puhti tells about the character's physical condition and strength. Low
blood pressure can be a sign of an unhealthy lifestyle or an incurable
disease; a character with high purity can be recognized by bulging
muscles, scarred face, gnarled hands, all-seeing eyes and crushing
strength.
Instinct tells about the character's natural balance. A low instinct can
be a sign of social awkwardness or a traumatic childhood; a character with
high instinct can be identified by graceful movement, penetrating gaze,
astonishingly good hearing, lovely appearance or sexual prowess.
Reason tells about the character's intelligence and patience. Low
intelligence can be a sign of laziness or inexperience; a character with high
intelligence can be identified by vocabulary, the ability to identify plants
and animals, skill at gambling, or power over others.
Power resources are measured by points, which are distributed to the
starting characters in total 11. At this point, each power resource must
have a minimum of 1 and a maximum of 7. The players do the distribution
as they see fit. There are no wrong answers, it's more about what kind of
image the player has of his character.

More about resources

Each power is a resource that the player can use when they want their
character to exert effort. This consumes power points, which are then
restored over time. The value set for the resource during character creation
therefore tells how many points the character has available for challenges
in its field.
Abilities, as you might expect, are always associated with one of the
three powers. This can be expressed by writing the name of the power (or
its abbreviation) after the name of the ability like this: "Sneak (instinct)"
or simply "Sneak (v)". For each ability, the character spends the points of
the associated power. By using points, you can increase the chance of
success when the ability is used.
If the players have come up with abilities for their characters that are
not in this book, the game director can decide which resource each ability
is associated with. Usually this is not very difficult.

You got it right

Tricks are special tricks that characters can learn. They expand abilities
and enable the learning of completely new abilities. Arts are often secrets
known to few, national special skills or special magical abilities. Typically,
a character uses spells with their powers, and thus cannot apply them
indefinitely. Common cons are listed on page 170.
The easiest way to explain the rules is with an example:

The art of the secret pocket

The character is good at hiding objects in different parts of his
body. Regardless of how thorough the character's body check is, he can
pull a bulky, small (hand-sized) object from his pivo if he succeeds at a
sneak check. Cost: 1 instinct.

In character creation, the player initially chooses one skill for his
character. It's quite possible that this skill is determined by the character's
species or culture; for example, the first skill of all hiis is the skill of
Dependence .
If the character is human, the player can choose which art they
want. Of course, some arts are culturally bound and rare, just like
abilities. The character can learn these later if he deals with characters who
know the art.

The first key

The last element of character creation are the keys, the things the player
thinks are central to their character. Keys are a character's goals, emotional
ties, or destiny that comes up again and again. Characters grow through
keys: when the conditions set by the character's key are met, the player
receives experience points (KP) that allow him to develop his character,
adding abilities, powers, skills and even new keys. Shadows of the Past is
a game about heroes who change the world, and so learning and
overcoming your own weaknesses are important elements in its
stories. Typical keys are listed on page 200.
An example is the best teacher even in the case of keys:

The key to despair

The character has lost hope.
1 CP
The character tries to dissuade others from their efforts.
3 CP
The character abandons an important conflict out of desperation.
Redemption
The character learns to hope again.

Redemption is a special feature of the key. When the character works as

described in the redemption, the player can optionally erase the key from
the character form and receive 10 experience points. Once the key is
redeemed, the character can never get the same key again.
In character creation, the player initially chooses one key for his
character. What is your character primarily about? Make it the key! Like
konsti, players can come up with their own keys in cooperation with the
game director, if nothing suitable for the character can be found in the
book.

Finishing the character

Once the character has abilities, powers, skills and keys, he is ready to
play! However, he is still quite inexperienced, so the party typically
matches a certain amount of experience levels that are added to characters
at the end of character creation. The usual number is five, which already
produces good starter characters.
Experience levels are simply an opportunity to improve various
aspects of a character. The attached table tells you how many experience
levels it takes to acquire abilities, powers, skills and keys. This is a good
opportunity to complete the character in the gaps left by the previous
stages: an extra key or even two, some secret that makes the character the
coolest of all, or simply more abilities and higher powers. All are good
ideas. The subtleties of using experience levels are explained in more
detail on page 49.
However, one limitation for the characters' experience must be
remembered: abilities, resources and skills can be unlimited, but the
number of keys is limited. A character can have a maximum of five keys at
a time.

Attention to character creation

A role player who has played some other games may now wonder how the
character's unique weaknesses and limitations are handled. The answer is
simple: if you want to play a character who is lame, one-eyed, or afraid of
heights, go for it! The game director does give your character a penalty
token if his weakness is annoying during the game.
You can also have fun with the character's weaknesses through this
key. Get your character a Kampurajala key or similar, and watch the
experience points pile up.

Experience table
Feature Price
Increasing the ability by a degree
To be able (1) 1
Experienced (2) 2
Master (3) 3
Grandmaster (4) 4
Increasing the asset by a point 1
Increasing the resource when >9 2
Learning the art 1
Taking the key 1

Character creation summary

1. Heroic Feat: Choose one ability that the character has at level experienced.
2. Background: choose three abilities at the level of capable.
3. Culture: choose the desired number of cultural or other important abilities at the unskilled level.
4. Passive Abilities: Organize Stamina, Reaction, and Resistance into skill levels unskilled, skilled, and
experienced.
5. Powers: allocate 11 points to wit, instinct and reason. Minimum 1 and maximum 7 points each.
6. Art: choose one art for the character.
7. Key: Choose one key for the character.
8. Finish: add five (or other agreed upon) experience levels.