Freelance Traveller

Quick Droyne Character Generation for Conventions

by Paul Anuni

Based on “Quick Character Generation for Conventions” by Marc Miller with Jeff Zeitlin, Freelance Traveller #084, November/December 2017, and my own “Quick Hiver Character Generation for Conventions”, Freelance Traveller #107, September/October 2021

Although my participation in the wider Traveller community is still limited, I continue to be an avid reader of Freelance Traveller in general, and have specific interest in the various after-action reports from conventions, including the virtual conventions during the world-wide panic over coronavirus. Jeff’s announcement that this year’s theme for TravellerCON/USA would be “The Ancients” and that the “matching” issue of Freelance Traveller would be themed on “The Ancients, Droyne, and Chirpers” inspired me to follow my own footsteps, and create a quick character generation for Droyne characters.

I’m taking things like skills, benefits, et cetera, from Alien Module 5: Droyne, on the Classic Traveller canon on CD-ROM. This folio should be considered mandatory reading to understand how Droyne view the various skills and how Droyne psionics work. Skills listed in this procedure are assumed to be interpreted as in the Alien Module, not the core rules.

Other material that might be of interest, but not used in development of this process, includes Adventure 2: Research Station Gamma, Adventure 3: Twilight’s Peak, Adventure 12: Secret of the Ancients, and the adventure “The Casteless” from Alien Realms.

There is an important difference between this procedure and the other procedures in this series: While failing the survival roll in the others means that the character died, in this procedure, the character has a choice: Normally, when a Droyne character is no longer useful to the oytrip, s/he is expected to commit ritual suicide. A small number of Droyne find that they are able to resist this, and continue as “Deathless”, krinaytsoyni.

The Process

Generating the Droyne Character

Droyne are generally smaller than humans, and Alien Module 5: Droyne instructs the player to roll 1D, not 2D, for each of the first five characteristics: Strength, Dexterity, Endurance, Intelligence, and Sense. The sixth characteristic, Caste, may be rolled randomly, or may be selected.

After determining the Caste, throw 1D: If 1, the character is of the “Negative” (“—”, in the table below) subcaste; if 6: the character is of the “Positive” (“+”) subcaste, otherwise “Neutral” (“¤”). This comes into play when determining skill availability.

There is no concept among the Droyne of nobility.

Resolving Terms

Because Droyne characteristics are low compared to other races, roll 1D only once. The result of this roll should be added to each term’s Controlling Characteristic only for the purpose of term resolution. This is not a “real” or permanent change to the characteristic. Further references to the “Controlling Characteristic” or “CC” should be understood to mean the actual characteristic plus this roll.

Droyne skills are not based on ‘career’ as for other races, but on caste. As with the original and Hiver versions of this process, select one of the character’s characteristics other than caste as the controlling characteristic for a term. You may not select a characteristic again until all five characteristics (STR, DEX, END, INT, SEN) have been used an equal number of times.

Droyne do not recognize concepts such as “commission” or “promotion” or “rank” (Age and seniority/experience serve to replace the latter). A Droyne character may earn Distinction; the effect of doing so allows the character to gain one additional skill for the term.

Roll 2D and compare to the Controlling Characteristic for this term. If less than or equal, the character has succeeded at this roll, otherwise the roll fails.

Survival:

Success means that your character has not died. Failure normally means that the character has died, but if the player prefers, the character may end generation, receiving no skills or benefits for this term, and begin adventuring as krinaytsoyni.

Distinction:

Success means that your character may take four skills for this term instead of three.

Continuation:

On success, you may if you wish continue to the next term, or you may choose to end character generation and begin adventuring. If this roll fails, you may not continue, and start adventuring.

In either case, record the benefit you have earned, but do not apply any characteristic or skill changes until you choose to end character generation.

Skill Selection:

After rolling for Continuation, choose three skills (four, if the character has succeeded at the distinction roll) from Table 5. Note the limitations below on which characters may pick from which boxes. Apply characteristic changes immediately.

Choosing Skills

Any character may choose skills from the “All Subcastes” box under the character’s caste. The boxes marked “Positive Subcastes”, “Neutral Subcastes”, and “Negative Subcastes” are only available to characters of that particular subcaste.

The Special Skills

There are three special entries: Psi, Cross-Train, and Black Skill, shown in italics in the table.

Psi:

if the character has SEN 5—, choose one Ability from the STANDARD box in the Psi column, and receive that Ability regardless of SEN. If the character already has SEN 6+ (and thus all of the Standard abilities), see “The Psi ‘Skills’ (Abilities)” later in this article.

Cross-Train:

choose one skill from the All Subcastes box for any other caste, or from any other caste’s subcaste box that matches the character’s own subcaste (that is, Positive subcastes may choose from the Positive Subcastes box for any other caste, Neutral subcastes from the Neutral Subcastes box, or Negative subcastes from the Negative Subcastes box).

Black Skill:

choose one of Forgery, Streetwise, Bribery, or Unarmed Combat

Weapon skills should be chosen for the specific weapon immediately.

The Psi “Skills” (Abilities)

The “Psi” column is special. All Droyne characters receive the two Abilities in the “Automatic” box; all other Abilities are available only to characters that have SEN 6+ (but see the Psi exception under “The Special Skills”). As soon as the character achieves this level (even if it is rolled as part of characteristic generation), award all the psionic Abilities in the “Standard” box; a character with SEN 6+ may choose one of the Abilities listed in the “Advanced” box as a “skill” for a term, but only actually receives it if a separate roll vs. the CC succeeds. Psionic Abilities do not have “levels” the way skills do; the character can either use the ability or not according to his SEN (corresponding to Psi for non-Droyne characters) using the standard psionic rules.

Term Benefits

After completing each term—survival, distinction, choosing skills, continuation—record the benefit from Table 6 for the character’s caste and term.

If a character serves for more than five terms, start again with a second instance of the Term 1 benefit, and proceed down the column for the character’s Caste.

Note that Worker-caste Droyne do not receive any term benefits. Weapon benefits represent possession of a weapon in which the character has skill; at the referee’s discretion, a second award may be either a second weapon (in the same or different skill) or a higher-quality weapon (replacing the initial weapon awarded). In the unlikely event of a second or subsequent award of Wings, the character should be given an additional level of Flying skill; a second or subsequent award of Ship is ignored. Technician Tool Kits are Electronic, Mechanical, or Gravitic, depending on which skill the Technician has. If more than one skill is available, choose the highest.

In addition to the normal benefit for each term as shown in Table 6, a character that earns a Distinction may choose one additional skill (from the allowed boxes in Table 5, but excluding “Cross-Train”) as a benefit (this includes Workers, who otherwise receive no benefits). If a characteristic change is chosen, do not apply it to the character’s profile until character generation is complete.