![]() Roles
Heroes in True20 come in different types and from many
walks of life. Your hero’s role is the part he or she plays in the game.
A role is like a character’s part in a story; stories have different sorts of
heroes, from brave and skilled warriors to cunning diplomats to wise wielders
of the arts. The role you choose for your hero affects the other choices you
make, including your hero’s skills and feats. Still, roles in True20 are
broad enough to allow plenty of freedom of choice
in creating your hero.
There are three roles in True20, in addition to heroes with
mixed, or multiple, roles. The roles are:
• Hacker: Someone who specializes in hacking.
• Expert: Someone experienced in a wide range of skills.
• Warrior: Someone with training in many forms of combat.
• Mixed-Role Heroes: Heroes start out with only one role at 1st
level. However, as your hero advances in level, you may choose levels in other
roles, creating a mixed-role hero. This mixing of roles gives a hero a wider
range of abilities at the cost of slowing advancement in any one role. For
example, a 1st-level warrior attaining 2nd level might choose to take
the 1st level in hacker instead of a 2nd level in warrior. The
hero is now a 1st-level warrior/1st-level hacker, but still a 2nd-level
character. The character’s combat abilities are less than those of a 2nd-level
warrior, but the character now has the abilities of a 1st-level hacker.
The key difference for mixed-role heroes is that each role has a core
ability, obtained only when a character starts out at 1st-level in
that role. A mixed-role hero taking on a new role does not gain the new role’s
core ability, but does gain all of its other traits.
Level-Dependent Benefits
Heroes improve in experience and hack by advancing in level. This
represents the progress of a hero’s career during a long series, from novice to
seasoned expert. As heroes advance in level, they gain additional bonuses and
access to more skills and feats, improving and expanding their capabilities.
After 1st level, heroes also get the opportunity to begin mixing roles to
further expand their options and capabilities. Certain benefits are based on a
hero’s overall level, regardless of role.
The Level-Dependent Benefits table summarizes these. See
each role description for the benefits specific to each.
Skill Rank
This lists the maximum rank a hero can have in any known skill,
equal to the hero’s level + 3. This is also the hero’s rank in any known hacks.
See Chapter 2: Skills and Chapter 4: Hacks for details.
Ability Increase
Upon gaining any level divisible by six (6th, 12th, and 18th),
heroes can increase an ability score by 1. You choose which ability you want to
improve, and the improvement is permanent. You can increase the same ability
more than once or a different one each time. You can increase an ability score
above +5 in this way.
Conviction
Heroes start out with 3 points of Conviction at 1st level and gain
a point of Conviction every two levels thereafter (3rd, 5th, and so on). The
number indicated at each level is a hero’s maximum Conviction points at that
level. See Conviction later in this chapter for details.
Feats
Your hero gets a certain number of starting feats at 1st level
(determined by role), plus an additional feat for each level beyond 1st. You
choose feats from among those available to your hero’s role(s).
Role Descriptions
The following sections describe the three roles in detail. Each
provides an overall view of the role, the role’s traits in game terms, and
examples of different types of heroes who fit that particular role.
The role’s traits are organized as follows:
Abilities
What ability scores are most important to the role and why? While
you can certainly choose your hero’s abilities as you wish, you might want to
keep these important abilities in mind, if you want your hero to be effective
in the chosen role.
Core Ability
Each role has a core ability, which you only gain if you
take your 1st level in that role. If you add a role later on (see Mixed-Role
Heroes) you don’t gain the new role’s core ability, just the ability of
your first role.
Skills
This is the number of skills you choose for a hero of that role at
1st level. You apply your hero’s Intelligence modifier to this number, but it
cannot be lower than 1, no matter how low a hero’s Intelligence might be. The
role also gains a number of additional skill ranks (also modified by
Intelligence) for each additional level.
Feats
These are the feats a hero starts with at 1st level. Each role
allows you to choose some or all of these feats from lists of feats available
to characters of that role.
Each role has a table indicating the role’s other game abilities,
all based on level:
Combat
A role’s base combat bonus measures skill in all forms of
fighting. It is used as the basis for a hero’s attack rolls, modified by
Dexterity. It is also used as the basis for a hero’s Defense score, which is
the Difficulty to strike that hero in combat. It is modified by the hero’s Dexterity
for dodging or evading attacks, and Strength for parrying them.
Save Bonuses
Roles have three save bonuses, measuring the ability to avoid
certain kinds of harm when they make saving throws. The bonuses are
improvements to Fortitude, Reflex, and Will saves. Toughness saving throws do
not improve by level, although some feats may improve them.
Reputation
Every hero has a reputation score based on role and level. See Reputation,
later in this chapter, for details.
Level-Dependent Benefits
Level Maximum Ability Conviction Feats
Skill Rank Increase
1st 4 — 2 4
2nd 5 — 2 1
3rd 6 — 2 1
4th 7 1st 3 1
5th 8 — 3 1
6th 9 — 3 1
7th 10 — 4 1
8th 11 2nd 4 1
9th 12 — 4 1
10th 13 — 5 1
11th 14 — 5 1
12th 15 3rd 5 1
13th 16 — 6 1
14th 17 — 6 1
15th 18 — 6 1
16th 19 4th 7 1
17th 20 — 7 1
18th 21 — 7 1
19th 22 — 8 1
20th 23 5th 8 1
Hacker
Abilities
Mental abilities are usually more important to hackers than
physical ones. In particular, hackers tend to require strong Wisdom scores,
since using their hacks depends on force of will to stave off fatigue.
Intelligence is nearly as important, given the hacker’s emphasis on
scholarship. Hackers also choose a mental ability as the key ability of their
hacks. Hackers also find a healthy Constitution helpful, especially if they
plan to exercise their arts in the field rather than in the comfort of a
college or academy
The Talent (Core Ability)
The hacker can spend a Conviction point to make one use of a hack
they do not possess. This works much like spending a Conviction point to
emulate a feat. An hacker with the Talent can also spend a Conviction point to
eliminate any accumulated modifiers to fatigue saving throws for using hacks.
See Chapter 4 for more information on hacks and later in this chapter for more
on Conviction.
Hacks
Hackers can develop and use certain hacks, described in detail in
Chapter 4. A hacker can choose to acquire a hack in
place of one of the hacker’s normal feats, either starting feats
or those acquired by improving in level. So a starting hacker can have up to
four hacks (at the cost of taking no starting feats), one hack and three feats,
two and two, or any combination
adding up to the hacker’s starting number of feats. Each time the
hacker gains a level the player has a choice of taking a new
feat or a new hack.
Skills
Choose 6 + Intelligence score starting skills (minimum of 1).
Hackers gain 6 + Int skill ranks per additional level (minimum of 1). Important
skills for hackers include Concentration, Craft, Gather Information, Knowledge
(particularly supernatural), Language, and Notice.
Feats
Choose 4 starting feats from the General and Hacker categories. An
hacker can also choose a hack in place of a feat.
The Hacker
Fort Ref Will
Level Combat Save Save Save Reputation
1st +0 +0 +0 +2 +1
2nd +1 +0 +0 +3 +1
3rd +1 +1 +1 +3 +1
4th +2 +1 +1 +4 +2
5th +2 +1 +1 +4 +2
6th +3 +2 +2 +5 +2
7th +3 +2 +2 +5 +2
8th +4 +2 +2 +6 +3
9th +4 +3 +3 +6 +3
10th +5 +3 +3 +7 +3
11th +5 +3 +3 +7 +3
12th +6 +4 +4 +8 +4
13th +6 +4 +4 +8 +4
14th +7 +4 +4 +9 +4
15th +7 +5 +5 +9 +4
16th +8 +5 +5 +10 +5
17th +8 +5 +5 +10 +5
18th +9 +6 +6 +11 +5
19th +9 +6 +6 +11 +5
20th +10 +6 +6 +12 +6
Expert
Abilities
Agility is the name of the game for experts, both physical agility
(represented by Dexterity) and social agility (represented by Charisma), with a
bit of mental agility (represented by Intelligence) thrown in for good measure.
Nimble experts are often trained in skills like Acrobatics and Ride, while the
personable and charming ones focus on interaction skills like Bluff and
Diplomacy. Wisdom is useful to experts in avoiding danger, from traps to
deception, and keen Intelligence can help an expert go far (and pick up a few
extra useful skills).
Expertise (Core Ability)
An expert can spend a point of Conviction to gain 4 temporary
ranks in any skill, including skills in which the expert is not currently
trained or that cannot be used untrained. These temporary skill ranks last for
the duration of the scene and grant their normal benefits.
Saving Throws
Experts vary in their Fortitude, Reflex, and Will save bonuses.
Choose one of these three to be the expert’s good save, with the other two as
normal saves, consulting the appropriate column on the table. For example, your
expert’s Fortitude save might be good, while her Reflex and Will saves are
normal. At 1st level, her base Fortitude save bonus would be +2, while her base
Reflex and Will saves would be +0.
Skills
Choose 8 + Intelligence score starting skills (minimum of 1).
Experts gain 8 + Int skill ranks per additional level (minimum
of 1). Virtually all skills are important to one sort of expert or
another. Experts tend to pick certain areas where they specialize, such as
athletic or outdoor skills (Acrobatics, Climb, Jump, and Survival, for
example), interaction skills (Bluff, Diplomacy, Perform, and Sense Motive), or
scholarly skills (such as Craft, Knowledge, and Notice).
Feats
Choose 4 starting feats from the Expert or General categories.
The Expert
Good Normal
Level Combat Save Save Reputation
1st +0 +2 +0 +1
2nd +1 +3 +0 +1
3rd +2 +3 +1 +1
4th +3 +4 +1 +2
5th +3 +4 +1 +2
6th +4 +5 +2 +2
7th +5 +5 +2 +2
8th +6 +6 +2 +3
9th +6 +6 +3 +3
10th +7 +7 +3 +3
11th +8 +7 +3 +3
12th +9 +8 +4 +4
13th +9 +8 +4 +4
14th +10 +9 +4 +4
15th +11 +9 +5 +4
16th +12 +10 +5 +5
17th +12 +10 +5 +5
18th +13 +11 +6 +5
19th +14 +11 +6 +5
20th +15 +12 +6 +6
Warrior
Abilities
Warriors prize physical abilities over mental ones. Strength is
important in striking a hackful blow. Dexterity allows warriors to evade
incoming attacks and gives them accuracy with their own. Constitution may be a
warrior’s most important quality, granting them the endurance to sustain long
marches and to fight on when others fall due to injury or fatigue.
Determination (Core Ability)
A warrior can spend a point of Conviction to immediately erase all
bruised and hurt damage conditions (and their associated penalties).
Skills
Choose 4 + Intelligence score starting skills (minimum of 1).
Warriors gain 4 + Int skill ranks per additional level (minimum of 1).
Important skills for warriors tend to be physical, such as Climb, Jump, and
Swim. They often acquire some type of vehicular skill (from Ride to Drive or
Pilot, depending on the transportation available). and Utility skills like
Concentration, Notice, and Sense Motive are common.
Feats
All warriors have Firearms Training or Weapon Training as a
starting feat. Choose 3 other starting feats from the General or Warrior
categories.
The Warrior
Fort Ref Will
Level Combat Save Save Save Reputation
1st +1 +2 +0 +0 +0
2nd +2 +3 +0 +0 +0
3rd +3 +3 +1 +1 +1
4th +4 +4 +1 +1 +1
5th +5 +4 +1 +1 +1
6th +6 +5 +2 +2 +1
7th +7 +5 +2 +2 +2
8th +8 +6 +2 +2 +2
9th +9 +6 +3 +3 +2
10th +10 +7 +3 +3 +2
11th +11 +7 +3 +3 +3
12th +12 +8 +4 +4 +3
13th +13 +8 +4 +4 +3
14th +14 +9 +4 +4 +3
15th +15 +9 +5 +5 +4
16th +16 +10 +5 +5 +4
17th +17 +10 +5 +5 +4
18th +18 +11 +6 +6 +4
19th +19 +11 +6 +6 +5
20th +20 +12 +6 +6 +5
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