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The Dresden Files => DFRPG => Topic started by: stabbald on March 15, 2011, 11:07:29 AM
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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.
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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 :P
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.
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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.
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- "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.
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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.
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I would give him an eidetic memory power.
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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.
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I meant a minor talent at 1 refresh or a mortal stunt.
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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).
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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.
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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.
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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.
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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.
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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.
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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
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That's an awesome character concept!
I also like the idea of trying to keep him as a mundane human as much as possible, and definitely make him more focused on deduction and using Aspects rather than having a high Scholarship. There have been two (I think) Sherlock Holmes stories in which Holmes is the narrator, rather than Watson, and it's done to highlight that Holmes simply doesn't have Watson's range of medical knowledge, and without his friend and partner, many cases are that much more challenging as a result.
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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).
Well... A lot of people don't seem to get that when Holmes made that claim to Watson during their first meeting (about actively avoiding learning things), he was just messing with Watson's head. Subsequently he demonstrates a wide range of knowledge about an incredible variety of topics.
Holmes has a nasty, sarcastic sense of humor and has no compunctions about lying to serve his purposes or because it would be funny. If you've ever seen the television show 'House', that's actually a pretty good picture of Holmes' personality from the stories.
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One thing you should focus on with your character is making him very good at assessments and skill based declarations, that is something that any Sherlock Holmes based character should use up to the point of abuse.
I came up with a similar idea to this when thinking of potential characters. Namely that a summer court noble created a Sherlock Holmes like illusion to mess with the head of some poor mortal. Due to the prominence of Sherlock Holmes in mortal culture the belief of all of the readers over the years centered itself on the simulacrum of Sherlock and allowed him to attain independence of the fairy that created him. The character would have had a mix of deceit and detection based powers due to his nature as a living illusion. Also his high concept would have been nicely alliterative, Seelie Sherlock Simulacrum.
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http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sherlock_holmes (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sherlock_holmes)
Hmmm... the scholarship and performance angles are trickier. His knowledge is, indeed, based on what he finds necessary for his work and interests. Perhaps an investigative stunt along the lines of using investigation in place of scholarship for research on evidence would be the correct approach.
He certainly maintained a catalogue of knowledge of forensic investigation techniques.
How about 'Forensic Scientist' or 'Encyclopedia of Practical Forensics'
Additionally, Holmes was a master of disguise and able to mimic patterns of speech well beyond simply copying accents.
Victorian Gentleman would certainly be an appropriate aspect for Holmes. The aspect could easily be invoked similarly to Harry's own 'Chivalry is not Dead, Dammit.'
Dr. Watson describes Holmes as living a 'Bohemian' lifestyle (one characterized by few permanent ties and largely focused on the individual's own pursuits (frequently esoteric or artistic in nature)). This could also be applied to an aspect. Holmes does what he does not primarily as a career, but because it is of interest to him. He's not a man of the system.
He is a loner and prone to fits of fugue. In our day, he would probably have been regarded as a low grade manic depressive.
Order in Chaos Holmes personal space appears to any conventional person as an absolute shambles, but his organization is not based on convention. It's more organic and holistic. Things in his space are positioned based on relationship, and he knows right where everything is. Despite this, he is also fastidious about his own appearance and grooming.
Holmes is a patriot as well. In many stories he undertakes a case for the good of England.
Holmes is also a habitual user of cocaine and, on occasion, morphine.
Holmes is a talented fist fighter and also well versed in martial arts and weapons (he uses his cane and a sword in the stories).
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Holmes is a talented fist fighter and also well versed in martial arts and weapons (he uses his cane and a sword in the stories).
Better represented by the Armed Arts stunt and a decent-to-high Fists skill than by a comparable skill in both Fists and Weapons
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Just tossing this out there. The series so far has been great, and the interaction between Holes and Watson struck me as very Harry/Murphy.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sherlock_%28TV_series%29 (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sherlock_%28TV_series%29)
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Well... A lot of people don't seem to get that when Holmes made that claim to Watson during their first meeting (about actively avoiding learning things), he was just messing with Watson's head. Subsequently he demonstrates a wide range of knowledge about an incredible variety of topics.
Holmes has a nasty, sarcastic sense of humor and has no compunctions about lying to serve his purposes or because it would be funny. If you've ever seen the television show 'House', that's actually a pretty good picture of Holmes' personality from the stories.
I disagree, I believe he was being very genuine. He shows a wide array of knowledge primarily concerning important people (who he considered to be the likely victims of relevant crimes) and the effects of ware on objects (which is his primary source of evidence). I'm pretty well versed in the Holmes of the books (and while House is a great modern interpretation I disagree that he represents Holmes' personality well rather he strongly resembles Holmes' idiosyncrasies).
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There have been different interpretations of Holmes' knowledge (or lack thereof).
It is generally accepted that Holmes' knowledge in his chosen field was vast; he was conversant with all major crimes, criminals, criminal methods, and the nascent science of detection.
Holmes deferred to Watson in any matter where applied medicine (as opposed to forensics) was concerned. This might have been politeness; but given Holmes' personality, that seems unlikely.
I think it would be fair (particularly if it fits your game, or your players' understanding of Holmes) to presume that Holmes' knowledge in any field that did not directly relate to crime was scanty at best. (Holmes makes reference to Moriarity's mathematical acumen, but more as a way of letting the reader know that Moriarity was no 'common criminal'. There's nothing to indicate that Holmes could follow the math involved in Moriarity's thesis.)
Holmes was portrayed as a focused genius; someone who was unequalled in his chosen field, but utterly unconcerned with anything outside of that focus.
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There have been different interpretations of Holmes' knowledge (or lack thereof).
It is generally accepted that Holmes' knowledge in his chosen field was vast; he was conversant with all major crimes, criminals, criminal methods, and the nascent science of detection.
Holmes deferred to Watson in any matter where applied medicine (as opposed to forensics) was concerned. This might have been politeness; but given Holmes' personality, that seems unlikely.
I think it would be fair (particularly if it fits your game, or your players' understanding of Holmes) to presume that Holmes' knowledge in any field that did not directly relate to crime was scanty at best. (Holmes makes reference to Moriarity's mathematical acumen, but more as a way of letting the reader know that Moriarity was no 'common criminal'. There's nothing to indicate that Holmes could follow the math involved in Moriarity's thesis.)
Holmes was portrayed as a focused genius; someone who was unequalled in his chosen field, but utterly unconcerned with anything outside of that focus.
I'd have to agree.
In regards to Watson, in "A Rare Disease" he intentionally hurts Watson's feelings in an effort to stop him from coming any closer to him while he feigns illness as he knows that Watson would spot the lack of real symptoms almost instantly. Even though Holmes starved himself for days and used his masterful abilities of disguise.
You don't need to understand a persons work to realise that they are a great leader in their field. A great example of this would be Einstien, considered to be one of the smartest people that ever lived and yet very few people understand the science behind his theories.
I like the idea of lowering his scholarship and using an aspect to represent his specialized knowledge.
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Holmes High Trouble would actually be. Epic Asshole. If you read Sherlock Holmes or watch the recent movie you will notice this. A scene in the movie that shows it really well is when Holmes was meeting Watson and Watson's Girlfriend for dinner. Anachronism would be his third aspect. Another aspect Holmes has is I avoid life with drugs or something along those lines.