Monday, 26 August 2013

Another Known Space NPC

This bloke has just wandered into my Known Space campaign. He's a bit of an arse.

Alpha Geek Omicron 1234 (Alec Lamplugh)
Homeworld: Scotland/EU/Earth, later Aquila/Aquila
Age: 39

Str:    7    +0
Dex   8    +0
End   10  +1
Int      11  +1
Edu   8    +0
SS    9    +1

Entertainer/Artist 5 terms, Rank 5
1 Found a patron, legendary punk artiste/label owner Harry Blackteeth (formerly of Bad McTatt and the Picts) +2 advancement
2 Criticise political leader – gain +1 in Investigate and an enemy
3 Gets a number one hit, +1 on any benefit roll
4 Need for more and more dubious implants leads into the criminal underworld, gain Streetwise
5 Become part of Aquila's celebrity circle, gain Persuade 1 due to ability to overawe the little people
Benefits – 160,000 Cr, 2 contacts, +2 Social, +1 Int

Skills
Persuade 0
Steward 0
Science (Cybernetics) 0
Art (Holography) 0
Carouse 0
Deception 1
Investigate 1
Persuade 1
Engineering (Electronic) 1
Computers 1
Streetwise 1
Art (Instrument) 4

Gear
Cybernetic implants – Cyber legs (advanced) Double speed, +2 to any athletics rolls involving legs
Enhanced Brain - + 1 Intelligence, computer interface, skill chip gives extra +1 Art (Instrument) skill
Radio Ears – pick up and transmit radio
Enhanced Eyes - general information chip, scleral surface veins rearranged in circuit board pattern to look Cybergothy
Moodaliser (as mood chip, but runs multiple programmes), with external surface update in the from of a glowing icon on his forehead
Cyberskin (+1 AP, resist cold/heat)

Depending on local law he will carry a monoblade and/or a laser pistol, though he has no idea how to use either properly and has a bodyguard for duffing over the disrespectful.

60% cybered, Sanity 0 (see Cybernetics notes)

Has a 200 ton yacht/tourbus, 'Ebonite Soul'.

Biography
Young Alec Lamplugh was Gothpunk Revival fan back in the 2280's (Gothpunk being the latest incarnation of Goth which had been revived every 50 years or so since the legendary Winter of Gloom of 1983, when hairspray supplies in Leeds were down to one half empty can and people made their own black lipstick with beef dripping and coal dust). He went on the local club circuit and was picked up by Harry Blackteeth, the front man for agit-thrash-celto-punk Bad McTatt and the Picts, who encouraged him in his latent obsession with cybernetics, turning him into a 'Cybergoth' and giving him the stage name 'Alpha Geek Omicron 1234'. 

Harry sensed that this distant, moody and nerdy young synth player needed only a bit of a kick to turn him into a proper rock and roll loon, reducing his career and probably lifespan but boosting his earning power. Alpha Geek Omicron was busted for being a wirehead (sending current directly into the pleasure centres of his brain), beating the rap by claiming it was the only way to control the weltschmerz and ennui brought on by inhabiting meatspace (well, Dundee). He led a failed campaign against the banning of mood chips in Scotland, though his fellow campaigners exposed the Scottish Home Secretary, Angus Davis, as using an Aggression Dial to up his vehemence levels during parliamentary debates ('Wee Angus goes up to 11' was one of Alpha Geek's biggest hits in his home country.)

He left Scotland and settled on Aquila, where though cybernetic enhancement was still banned, he was a bigger fish in a smaller pond, and became one of the planets biggest rock stars, going on interstellar tours back into the core sectors to play ever larger gigs and spend time at various dodgy and experimental clinics having yet more of his biological substance replaced by silicon, rubber and stainless steel.

Alpha Geek is an impressive looking bloke, seven feet tall (he has had the pale ginger Scottish legs he was born with replaced by springloaded metal ones a couple of feet longer), covered in black rubberised skin, with various bits of chrome stuck on in a rather obvious way, a big up yours to the many in Known Space who regard cyber enhancement as dangerous, uncool and very, very nerdy. He is also completely barmy, a manic depressive with more than a touch of megalomania, but a lot of people take this as side effects of being a rock star rather than of being mostly robotic. He leads a peculiar peripatetic life on his yacht/tour bus 'Ebonite Soul', sometimes arriving like royalty with full pomp and circumstance, other times slinking on and off a planet dressed head to foot in bandages like a burn victim. He spends a lot of his time in a sensory deprivation tank while a computer feed sends randomised signals to his moodaliser and records the resulting musical output from the synth and composition computer built into his brain and spinal column.

Every now and again he will spend some time 'dead', going into a low berth for way beyond the recommended time limits, as way of avoiding taxes and extending his lifespan. He has announced his intention to live forever several times and has (very expensively) downloaded a rough simulacrum of his personality into a number of computers he calls 'beta geeks'. He has sent beta geeks out to do gigs for him. He claims the performance was in fact better though several times when this has happened the audience demanded their money back.

He has a number of full time roadies, sycophants, cyberneticists and bodyguards who treat him as royalty, he might be be angling to become a cult leader of sorts. All his followers sport cyber enhancements, and unkind and paranoid types say he uses these to control his entourage.

He knows and can call on Harry Hurley, leader of the New Dorset Independence Party and current heir apparent to the Microsoft Corporate Kingdom (the CEOship has become hereditary since Microsoft became a constitutional monarchy in the revolution of 2216) Prince Louis Kimball-Gates XIV, who are both fans. (Note: The XIV is a serial number, the Kimball-Gates family clone themsleves then choose the sanest and least mutated to ascend the throne).

Aplha Geek is currently on tour and is stopping off at Annabel's Grave to organise the rescue of her poor misunderstood brain from the depths of a frozen sea.

No comments:

Post a Comment