Character Players Guide

At Darkwood Nights you take on a character, a person, different and distinct from yourself. You will put parts of yourself into that character and, while playing, rely on a lot of your real world skills at game. However they also have skills, abilities and powers you, the player, do not possess. This document will walk you through the statistics that make up Characters at Darkwood Nights and how they advance and change over time. 

It is important to draw a line between you, the player, and your characters. Your Characters will go through hell, other characters will betray them, stab them in the back, try to kill them, or tear down everything they’ve built. The World of Darkness is a dangerous and dark place that lends itself to amazing stories and experiences you, the player, can have as your character but at the end of the day it is vital to remember that the other characters you are in conflict with ARE characters and not the players themselves. We all experience Bleed, a term used to describe when feelings we experience as our characters bleed into our real thoughts and feelings as the player, and we all need to remember to reach out and get to know the players so we can see them as distinct from their characters

The Character sheet is where you record your character's abilities, called Statistics. There are four types of Statistics; Abilities, Attributes, Pools, and Weaknesses. All of these Statistics are recorded on your character sheet and you have access to all them throughout play. 

• Abilities: Abilities are granted by Faction or Subfaction rules and all members of those groups gain the listed Abilities. They do not usually have a rating but provide mechanics that are unique to that Faction or Subfaction. 

• Attributes: Attributes provide powers or mechanics but are not granted to all members of a Faction. They typically have a Dot Rating of 1-4, but some go higher. Each Dot Rating provides a power or mechanic and details the costs for using it. Some Dot Ratings provide more than one power, usually when a group of powers are themed together in canon. Skills, Disciplines, Pillars and Dominions are all examples of Attributes.

• • • Specialities: These are a special kind of Attribute that has prerequisites that must be met before they are purchased. While they may have a Dot Rating they do not need to be purchased in any order and are always purchased individually. Rotes, Devotions and Merits are Specialities.

• Pools: Pools always have a Dot Rating, usually 1-10 but sometimes more. Pools provide points that are used, lost, and replenished throughout the game. Unless stated otherwise a character begins the game with as many points as their Pool Rating. For example a character with 6 dots of Willpower Pool will start a game with 6 Willpower Points.

• Weaknesses: Weaknesses are given by a Faction, Subfaction or by an Attribute. They do not have ratings, instead they modify, or add, mechanics for the character. For example, Vampire’s Sunlight weakness means they take Aggravated Damage while in Sunlight.

Universal Statistics

All characters at Darkwood Nights share a common set of Statistics that Factions add to. They are:

• Faction: The Faction the character belongs to.

• Subfaction: The Subfaction the character belongs to.

• Health Pool: Your Character’s physical health. All characters start with a Health Pool of 10, but game effects may lower this. Only characters of the Monster Faction can have a Health Pool higher than 10.

• Willpower Pool: Your character’s strength of mind, Willpower Pool is used to resist and use powers. It has a Rating 1-10. A character’s Willpower Points are fully replenished after 5 hours of continuous sleep.

• Skills: Skills are an Attribute that grant powers or mechanics to your character.

• Energy Pool/s: The energy type/s granted by a character’s Faction. Humans do not have an Energy Pool unless another effect provides it. 

• Patron: The Spirit or Demon that has claimed the character and that the character has chosen to follow. This starts blank, a Patron must be earned at Game. 

More Details about the app and character tools can be found HERE

How to Create / Submit a Character: 

• Under your 'Character' tab click 'new' 

• Give them a name. 

• Choose Faction, Sub-Faction(s), and Gramarye Specialization (if you chose Fae). 

• Move the Character to Draft 

  • • This will lock Faction, Sub-Faction(s), and Gramarye Specialization, but it will populate the Character with all of their innates based on those selections. 

• Add the Character Details

  • • Allocate your free Dots and determine your required Statistics.

    • Adjust Character as desired. (Add Attributes and Specialties, increase Pools or Rating, etc.) through allocating XP and Kismet. 

    • Write a Character Background (please keep it to a 3-5 paragraph summary) 

    • Write 2 NPC's - One Ally and one Antagonist for your character 

• Once you are happy with how your character looks, press the ‘submit’ button. 

  • • This will require you to have enough XP and Kismet to pay for them*.

    •  If you don’t have enough you will not see the 'submit' button. 

*Note: XP and Kismet are not required to draft characters. There is no limit to the number of new (draft) characters a player can have. But in order to submit a character, you must have at least as much XP and Kismet as it will cost to create that character and is a requirement to have them approved. Once approved the XP and Kismet (if any) used for the build will be spent. 

Odoo Bug Report - This app is still in development, if you encounter a problem or need to report a bug please let us know in the Discord Server

After you have your character’s attributes are sorted out you will need to determine their starting equipment. Generally characters will be able to purchase 4 to 5 items at Character Creation. Each character has 13 Resources to create their starting equipment from the list below:

• Soft Armor: 3

• Ridged Armor: 5

• Lock and Key: 2

• Shackles and Key: 3

• Rope: 2

• Small Weapon: 3

• Medium Weapon: 4

• Large Weapon/Staff/Polearm: 5

• Thrown Weapons/Arrows (x6): 3

• Bow: 3

• Shield: 3

• Commodity: 1, must be obtainable with the Trade Skill

Example: Rynard is purchasing starting equipment for their new character. They have 13 tags to purchase their equipment with. They have Melee 2 and want a sword and shield so spend a total of 7 Resources on a medium weapon and a shield. Next they want some protection and so spend 3 Resources on soft armor for their gambison. Since they’ve spent 10 tags and are done purchasing equipment they choose to get 3 to Iron tags for 3 Resources to trade or sell in game.

Crafting at Character Creation: Characters with the Alchemy or Smithing Skills may use their Resources to purchase Commodities that they then craft into items. They are still limited to the number of items they can craft in a single game, however the creation costs are cheaper overall. See Comprehensive Rules Doc or Economy & Items Guide for Item Crafting rules.

Coin: Finally all characters start the game with 3 Pfennig, the coin commonly used in trade in the 900’s.

Skills represent the mundane abilities of your character, their training, profession, and hobbies. Skills are an Attribute and ranked 1-4. The first rank of a skill requires teaching, purchasing subsequent dots does not.  For example, to buy Smithing 1 you need to find a character with Smithing to teach you you already have Smithing 1 you can simply purchase Smithing 2 with XP. 

The Skills available and a summary of what they do are below.

Alchemy: Is one of the profession skills and grants the ability to craft Potions and Poisons with ingredient tags. Humans can only grant mundane Apothic items, while Supernatural Factions can craft Alchemical items. 

Dot Powers

  1 Craft 1 Dot Alchemical Items for 1 Apothic/Alchemical Ingredient

  2 Craft 2 Dot Alchemical Items for 1 Apothic/Alchemical Ingredient

  3 Craft 3 Dot Alchemical Items for 2 Apothic/Alchemical Ingredient

  4 Craft 4 Dot Alchemical Items for 2 Apothic/Alchemical Ingredient

Archery: Grants the ability to use bows.

Dot Powers

  1 May use a bow, damage calls are equal to 1 + Augment

  2 Augment 1 with bows

  3 Cost: 1 Willpower Point - Immobilize with Archery.

  4 Add Sunder to Archery attack calls

Brawl: Enhances the use of natural weapons, such as fists, claws, or shadow weapons. 

Dot Powers

  1 May use Stagger 3 times per 10 minutes with Natural Weapon Damage Calls

  2 Cost: 1 Willpower Point - Disarm

  3 Augment +1 when attacking with Natural Weapons

  4 May parry Melee Weapons with Fist Boffers, Gain Resist Status 1 per 10 minutes

Crafting: A second profession skill that grants the ability to make Soft Armor, Bows, Arrows, Shields, Stakes and Rope which are purchased at check in. 

Dot Powers

  1 Can purchase up to 3 items at Check In.

• Spend 5 minutes to maintain Soft Armor

  2 Can purchase up to 4 items at Check In

• Spend 3 minutes to maintain Soft Armor

  3 Can purchase 5 items at Check In.

• Alternatively can craft one batch of Arrows using the following rules

• Add the Iron damage type to a weapon you are crafting by using 3 times the Iron tags and no Coal tags

• Add the Silver / Gold Damage type to a weapon you are crafting by replacing the Iron tags with Silver / Gold tags

  4 Can purchase up to 6 items or two Iron/Silver/Gold Arrow Batches at Check In. 

• Spend 1 minute to maintain Soft Armor

Dodge: Dodge grants the character uses of the Perfect Dodge. Effectively this skill grants 1-4 uses of the Perfect Dodge power every combat encounter.

Dot Powers

 1-4 Use Perfect Dodge equal to Dodge Skill Rating times per 10 minutes

Escape Artist: Allows the character to remove bindings they are restrained with. 

Dot Powers

  1 Cost: Spend 4 minutes working out of the binding - Escape Binding

  2 Cost: Spend 2 minutes working out of the binding - Escape Binding

  3 Cost: Spend 1 minutes working out of the binding - Escape Binding

  4 Cost: Spend 30 seconds working out of the binding - Escape Binding

Fortune Telling: Fortune Telling is used by mystics, priests, and doctors to restore or remove Willpower Points from their subjects. While this power can only be used on the same character once per day the user can use this power a number of times per hour equal to their dots in Fortune Telling. 

Dot Powers

 1-4 Use Fortune Telling a equal to Fortune Telling Rating times per Hour

• Cost: Spend 1 minute roleplaying telling a willing target, other than yourself, their fortune or participating in religious ceremony - Fortune Telling

 4 Cost: 1 Willpower - Sense Will

Intimidation: Pure and simply this skill is the ability to overtly get people to do what you want. This can be through force of personality, physical threats or negotiation and grants the user the ability to use the Command power for free a number of times per Game equal to this Skill’s rating.

Dot Powers

 1-4 Use Command equal to your Intimidation Rank per game.

Literacy: Without this skill a character does not know how to read and write. At 1 Dot you know how to read and write English (we know we’re in Germany, but with languages we’re keeping things simple). 

Special: To write in a language other than English the player writes in big capital letters at the top of the document what language it is written in.

Dot Powers

  1 Can read and write English

  2 Can read and write Latin

  3 Can read and write an additional language

  4 Can read and write an additional language

Lockpicking: This Skill allows characters to open locks without a key, given time. Once the lock is picked, place the prop next to the thing (door, chest, or whatever) it was attached to but keep the tag on the lock.

Dot Powers

  1 Cost: Spend 4 minutes RPing picking a lock - open the lock

  2 Cost: Spend 2 minutes RPing picking a lock - open the lock

  3 Cost: Spend 1 minute RPing picking a lock - open the lock

  4 Cost: Spend 30 seconds RPing picking a lock - open the lock

Medicine: Medicine is a character's skill in healing. At 1 and 3 dots additional powers are gained.

Dot Powers

 1-4 Cost: 1 minute RPing applying bandages or otherwise healing a wounded character

• Heal the HP up to your dot level of Medicine. 

• Target is then Immune to healing from the Medicine skill for 1 hour.

  1 Cost: 1 Minute of RP examining the Target: Sense Life

  3 Cost: 1 Minute of RP examining the Target: Sense Agg

Melee: Is a character’s training with melee weapons such as swords, spears, clubs and axes. 

Dot Powers

  1 May wield a single single Melee Weapon

  2 May wield 2 Melee Weapons, a single weapon and shield, or a shield on its own

  3 Augment +1 when attacking with Melee Weapons

  4 Cost: 1 Willpower Point - Disarm

Smithing: Is the third profession skill and grants the ability to make Melee Weapons, Rigid Armor, Thrown Weapons, Locks, Keys, and Shackles, purchased at check in. Each item has different costs and as the Smith increases their skill the time it takes to make items decreases, allowing them to make more between games. This skill also is key to maintaining rigid armor each day so it can be used. 

Dot Powers

  1 Can purchase up to 3 items at Check In.

• Spent 5 minutes to maintain Rigid Armor

  2 Can purchase up to 4 items at Check In.

• Spend 3 minutes to maintain Rigid Armor

  3 Can purchase 5 items at Check In.

• Alternatively can craft one Melee Weapon using the following rules

• Add the Iron damage type to a weapon you are crafting by using 3 times the Iron tags and no Coal tags

• Add the Silver/Gold Damage type to a weapon you are crafting by replacing the Iron tags with Silver/Gold tags

  4 Can purchase up to 6 items or two Iron/Silver/Gold Melee Weapons at Check In. 

• Spend 1 minute to maintain Rigid Armor

Stealth: Stealth is how well your character can distract the attention of onlookers. It grants the character uses of the Distract power equal to their dot rating in Stealth per hour.

Dot Powers

 1-4 Use Distract up to your Stealth Rating per Hour.

Trade: Is the final profession skill and incompasses all non crafting professions. When you purchase Trade you choose between the following: Forager, Eccentric, Miner, Hunter, Logger, Cutter, or Burner. 

Your choice determines what Commodities you receive as well as how you obtain them. Different game effects may impact how many Commodity tags are generated from Trade each game, however the minimum you will always be able to collect is equal to this skill’s dot rating. Each specialization acts as follows: 

• Forager: Gains Apothic Ingredient tags needed for crafting Potions/Poisons

• Eccentric: Gains Alchemical Ingredient tags needed for Alchemy Potions/Poisons

• Miner: Gains Iron tags used to craft items, may be able to gain other metal tags

• Hunter: Gains Fur tags used to craft items

• Logger: Gains Log tags that are used to craft bows and turned into lumber for town improvements.

• Cutter: Can turn 1 Log tag into 2 Lumber tags per dot of Trade.

• Burner: Can turn 1 Log tag into 2 Charcoal tags per dot of Trade, which are used to craft most metal items.

Dot Powers

 1-4 Gain Commodities at check-in

A quick note on the Profession skills, Alchemy, Smithing and Trade. While it is possible for a character to possess all three skills they can only benefit from one per Check In. This means if a character has Alchemy 3 and Trade: Forager 2 they can choose to purchase Potions/Poisons OR gain Apothic Ingredient tags at each check in, not both. These skills represent your characters work time between games and they only have so much time in a day 

Players accumulate Experience Points (XP) that they can spend on any of their Characters by attending games of Darkwood Nights. XP is tracked at the Player level and does not need to be spent on the character played during the game it was earned. 

• XP may be earned / converted in 3 ways

  • • 2 xp per game attended

    • Human characters earn 4 xp per game attended

    • Kismet may be converted by spending 5 kismet for 1 xp (not to exceed 2 xp per game)

All Attributes and Pools listed on the same line, or a subsection, of the XP Chart below are a singe Attribute Type. The number is how much XP is spent to raise that Attribute by 1 dot. No single Attribute Type may be raised by more than one dot each game, however Characters not played at past games may raise Attributes for the games they missed.

For example, let's say I was playing a Fae. The Fae’s Mists and Weaving Pools are part of the same Attribute Type and cost 3xp to increase (As shown on its listing, “Mists Pool/Weaving Pool: 3xp”). My Fae hasn’t been played for 4 games and I have 20xp. I can choose to purchase 4 dots between my Mists and Weaving, choosing to increase my Weaving by 3 and my Mists by 1 and spending 12 of my 20xp.

Attribute and Pool XP Costs:

• Willpower: 2xp

• Skill: 1xp

• Merit: 4xp

• Disciplines

  • • In Clan Discipline: 1xp

    • Discipline: 2xp

• Devotion: 2xp

• Road: 1xp

• Generation: 3xp (only at Character Creation, Max Gen 7)

• Font: 3xp

• Foundation: 2xp

• Pillar: 3xp

• Awareness: 1xp

• Rote: 1xp

• Mists Pool/Weaving Pool: 1xp

• Fae Mien Trait: 2xp

• Kenning / Gramarye: 2xp

• Dominions

  • • Preferred Dominion: 3xp

    • Dominion: 4xp

Some Attributes either require teaching or are cheaper to purchase if they are taught. To teach another character an Attribute the teacher must have that Attribute on their Character Sheet at, or above, the level to be taught. The teacher then spends at least 30 minutes roleplaying instructing the student In Game on how to use/learn the Attribute. Some Attributes will have additional requirements for the teacher or student as detailed in their Faction rules. 

After the Student will enter into the App what they were taught by filling out the Teaching Form, which will require the student to know the name of the Player and Character who taught them and the Attribute taught. This will then send a confirmation message to the Teacher through the Player App and, once they confirm, the teaching will be recorded. Any number of Attributes may be recorded as being taught.