Sherlock Holmes -- Unstuck in time

[stabbald]

I'm thinking of creating a character that is very much inspired by Holmes, even down to the victorian origin. The idea would be that he solved a mystery for a faerie and asked the faerie for a rather unusual form of payment; to see the future. This he assumed would improve his detective abilities. Unluckily for him the faerie decided to twist his request, for maximum amusment. Instead of granting him some kind of supernatural ability, he merely used the time altering powers of certain areas of the Nevernever to dump Holmes into the present.

Thus he saw, and became stuck in, the future.

I love the idea for this character and it'd be fun to play someone who is so anachronistic but I can't for the life of me figure out how to make him. I'm guessing he would be mortal with a bunch of stunts (possibly some homebrew ones) but I'm hardly an expert with the rules. So I'm looking for help. Have any of you attempted to stat out Holmes? If so what did you guys come up with?

Thanks. 

[Mal_Luck]

I thought about doing something like this before with a cowboy displaced into present.

For Holmes... High Investigation is a given, perhaps a stunt that moves the Reading People trapping over to Investigation (I think I saw one on the Batman build a long time ago and they called it "Cold Read") couple that with Read the Surface (from the book) and a stunt that I got from the master list and updated for my own use.

Read You Like A Book (Empathy) [-1]: People's emotions are pretty damn obvious to you. Add two to your Empathy skill when using it to read people and for the number of aspects you can reveal with your Empathy.

Just replace Empathy with Investigation  

High scholarship is also probably a good idea and going on the most recent movie... Fists and Weapons (or Fists with Armed Arts) is probably a decent idea.

[stabbald]

This is what I'm thinking so far.

Sherlock Holmes

High Concept: Consulting Detective

Trouble: Living Anachronism

Aspects

- "Elementary."

- Insufferable Genius. (Stolen from a post by Buscadera)

Can't think of any others at the moment.

Skills

Superb - Investigation
Great - Scholarship, Alertness
Good - Fists, Intimidation
Fair - Displine, Presence
Average - Stealth, Deceit, Perform

Stunts

Corner of my eye
Make up Artist
Disguise is just a matter of details (Use Investigation for disguise trapping)
Cold Read (Use Investigation for reading people)
Read the Surface
Scene of the Crime
Quick Eye
Read You Like A Book (Investigation)

Adjusted Refresh: 2

This is based on waist deep, with one milestone. Though, he doesn't seem holmes-y enough. Should probably have more skills and stunts, maybe this is earlier in his career.

EDIT: Switched weapons with intimidation. Switched conviction with presence.

[Wolfwood2]

- "Elementary."

- Insufferable Genius. (Stolen from a post by Buscadera)

Probably also something about how he craves stimulation, whether from an interesting case or from drugs.

Skills

Superb - Investigation
Great - Scholarship, Alertness
Good - Fists, Weapons
Fair - Displine, Conviction
Average - Stealth, Deceit, Perform

He definitely needs a higher than mediocre Presence.  I would drop Conviction and exchange it for Presence.  He can defend against mental assualts with Discipline, but I don't think his psyche is as hardy as all that.

I also think having both Weapons and Fists is probably unnecessary.  I would give him Fists with a couple of stunts and switch Weapons for... wait for it... Drive.  Obviously this doesn't represent him being a racecar driver, but rather his ability to acquire and utilize intimate knowledge of the city where he lives.  He knows where every street goes, can navigate shortcuts, jknows where every business is located, and so on.  Though I suppose you could instead take a stunt allowing him to use Scholarship in place of Drive for purposes of navigation.

If you did that, then give him Intimidation instead.  Holmes was pretty good at staring people down.

[stabbald]

Probably also something about how he craves stimulation, whether from an interesting case or from drugs.

A very good idea. It'll also be interesting to see him trying to track down cocaine in the modern world, he comes from a place where it was legal.

He definitely needs a higher than mediocre Presence.  I would drop Conviction and exchange it for Presence.  He can defend against mental assualts with Discipline, but I don't think his psyche is as hardy as all that.

You're probably right about this, I think I'll edit Presence instead of Conviction. Mostly due to reputation, even out of his own time if people believe that he is in fact really Sherlock Holmes (Which would probably take some convincing with normals) he would probably be able to rely on his name alone for various beneficial effects.

I also think having both Weapons and Fists is probably unnecessary.  I would give him Fists with a couple of stunts and switch Weapons for... wait for it... Drive.  Obviously this doesn't represent him being a racecar driver, but rather his ability to acquire and utilize intimate knowledge of the city where he lives.  He knows where every street goes, can navigate shortcuts, jknows where every business is located, and so on.  Though I suppose you could instead take a stunt allowing him to use Scholarship in place of Drive for purposes of navigation.

If you did that, then give him Intimidation instead.  Holmes was pretty good at staring people down.

I see where you're coming from with this one, but I think I'll have to disagree. While his knowledge of London is supreme, it's the knowledge of London of well over a hundred years ago. I'm not sure that's going to be very useful outside of old landmarks and the basic layout of the city. I agree that the weapon skill is a waste and only included it because he's supposed to be a very capable swordsman, though on reflection I think I'll replace it with Intimidation as that is a very good idea and gives him more of a Holmes-y feel.

I don't think I'll give him any fists stunts to back up his fighting though as he only has 2 refresh left. He was supposed to be an expert boxer (with a knowledge of at least one obscure martial art) but having read many of the stories I never really saw him as a martial artist.

Thanks for the input, very helpful.

[ways and means]

I would give him an eidetic memory power.

[stabbald]

I would give him an eidetic memory power.

This is an interesting idea, though I'm not sure how it would work. Do you mean as a stunt or by turning him into a Minor Talent? It could be an Aspect.

[ways and means]

I meant a minor talent at 1 refresh or a mortal stunt. 

[Tallyrand]

If we're going by the Sherlock Holmes of the books I'd personally drop Scholarship entirely, instead giving him a stunt or an Aspect (Home Made Encyclopedia of Crime) to get largely the same effect.  Holmes didn't have broad knowledge at all and actually actively avoided learning anything that wouldn't directly facilitate crime solving (his hobbies of recreational chemistry and the violin not withstanding).

[stabbald]

If we're going by the Sherlock Holmes of the books I'd personally drop Scholarship entirely, instead giving him a stunt or an Aspect (Home Made Encyclopedia of Crime) to get largely the same effect.  Holmes didn't have broad knowledge at all and actually actively avoided learning anything that wouldn't directly facilitate crime solving (his hobbies of recreational chemistry and the violin not withstanding).

An extremely good idea. He needs the extra skill points and I think it would be closer to the character as well.

[Tallyrand]

Also, personal I'd make one of his aspects (or perhaps even his Trouble) The 7% Solution or something to that effect, but if you don't want to play out a drug addict you could always say he kicked the habit.

[Bruce Coulson]

I would vote for keeping Holmes a pure, but extremely talented mortal.

Also, you could justify lowering his Scholarship with the Linguistics Stunt and another Stunt reflecting that narrow focus of Holmes' studies.  Outside of the science of detection, Holmes really wasn't that educated, by intention.

His Deceit should definitely be higher; Holmes regularly disguised himself on cases (taking an impish delight in surprising Watson).  I think Performance can be dropped; although Holmes supposedly did act on stage, it was not a skill he demonstrated by the time of the stories.

'Baritsu' was the martial art Holmes studied; I believe there is one reference to single-stick fighting.  Again, a Stunt could probably handle that issue.

[Bruce Coulson]

probably an Aspect for his violin playing; although Watson thought he was good, there's no record of Holmes performing in front of an audience.

[Sanctaphrax]

Just popping in to point out that Up To Your Waist characters are capped at Great for skills.

I don't know much about Sherlock, but my impression has always been that he makes a lot of Declarations and Assessments. There are a lot of things you can do with that, stuntwise.

Also, there's a Homebrew Stunts Master List on the Resources board that I always point out when a thread like this shows up.

Also, there's a Sample Character Concepts thread on that same board where this guy can go once you're done with him.

[Richard_Chilton]

I would really recommend an aspect targeting drug use and the other changes in laws.  Maybe something like:
It Was Legal Then
- because a lot of things that were perfectly legal back then are illegal today.

Tag for help with anything that acceptable then but a crime now, or anything to do with the classic drugs. 

Compel for drug use or things that are crimes now but weren't then.

Holmes injected morphine and a solution made up of 7% cocaine - openly.  When Watson stumbled over Holmes in an opium den Watson's only reaction was horror that Holmes was using a low class drug (raw opium) as opposed to what upper classes used (morphine, heroin, laudanum, etc).

Of course, it all depends on how realistically you want to portray the Victorian days, and it could be argued that this is covered by his Trouble.

Richard