Albert of Venice

[Longes]

  

 

 

 

 

 

Name: Albert of Venice	Nature: Philosopher	Generation: Generation
Player: Longes	Demeanor: Architect	Concept: Biz wiz
Chronicle: Chronicle	Clan: Clan	Haven: Haven

 

 

PHYSICAL Strength ●○○○○ Dexterity ●○○○○ Stamina ●○○○○

SOCIAL Charisma ●●○○○ Manipulation ●●○○○ Appearance ●○○○○

MENTAL Perception ●●●○○ Intelligence ●●●○○ Wits ●○○○○

 

 

 

TALENTS Alertness ●○○○○ Athletics ○○○○○ Awareness ○○○○○ Brawl ●○○○○ Empathy ●○○○○ Expression ●●●○○ Intimidation ●○○○○ Leadership ●●●○○ Legerdemain ○○○○○ Subterfuge ●●●○○

SKILLS Animal Ken ○○○○○ Archery ○○○○○ Commerce ●●●○○ Crafts ○○○○○ Etiquette ●○○○○ Melee ○○○○○ Performance ○○○○○ Ride ○○○○○ Stealth ●○○○○ Survival ○○○○○

KNOWLEDGES Academics ●○○○○ Enigmas ○○○○○ Hearth Wisdom ○○○○○ Investigation ●○○○○ Law ○○○○○ Medicine ○○○○○ Occult ●●●○○ Politics ○○○○○ Seneschal ●●●○○ Theology ●●○○○

 

 

DISCIPLINES Discipline ○○○○○ Discipline ○○○○○ Discipline ○○○○○ Discipline ○○○○○ Discipline ○○○○○

BACKGROUNDS Resources ●●●●● Influence ●●●○○ Background ○○○○○ Background ○○○○○ Background ○○○○○

VIRTUES Conscience/Conviction ●●●○○ Self-Control/Instinct ●●●●○ Courage ●●●●○

 

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MERITS/FLAWS Lucky 4 Multi-Lingual 2 Literate 1   Can't Cross Running Water 4 Touch of Frost 1 Deep Sleeper 1 Rival 1

ROAD Humanity ●●●●● ●●○○○ Aura: Aura ( )   WILLPOWER ●●●●● ●●●●○ □□□□□ □□□□□   BLOOD POOL □□□□□ □□□□□ □□□□□ □□□□□ □□□□□ □□□□□ □□□□□ □□□□□ Blood Per Turn: ■

HEALTH Bruised       □ Hurt -1       □ Injured -1    □ Wounded -2    □ Mauled -2     □ Crippled -5   □ Incapacitated □   WEAKNESS Weakness   EXPERIENCE Experience

Edited May 17, 2022 by Longes (see edit history)

[Longes]

 

A Venetian monk in his 30s. Albert is a member of the San Giorgio monastery, with a more specific occupation being a quartermaster and an accountant.

Albert, a second son of a minor noble, was given away to a monastery to avoid inheritance complications. Early on he showed a good head for numbers, and apprenticing under the older quartermaster built up economic savvy. From the monastery's library Albert learned natural and occult sciences, delving into numerology and following its principles in business dealings.

Albert is a portly and jovial man, happy to socialize with everyone, and holding no prejudice - he rubbed shoulders with almost every kind of person in Venetian ports. Past that facade, is a calculating business-oriented mind. However, Albert is not especially corrupt - he's truly pious, earnestly believes in God, and tries to do good by his fellow man.

 

 

Resources. Albert's position as the money man in one of the richest monasteries in Europe has enabled him to establish quite a bit of personal wealth. Distributed across European banks, stakes in trade routes, and noble loans, the humble monk has access to money virtually everywhere.

Influence. In the monastery Albert had an opportunity to meet and hobnob with many nobles and their scions. He's also famous across the Benedictine order as a skilled worker who multiplied the wealth of his monastery.

Rival. Felix, a Bohemian caravaneer. Felix lost money trading with San Giorgio monastery, and is convinced that Albert is to blame.

Edited May 16, 2022 by Longes (see edit history)

[Scarecrow71]

@Longes

 

I cannot reconcile your Attributes, Skills (Knowledges), Backgrounds, Virtues...pretty much all the dots.  Please re-check the rules thread - especially for Attributes - and then provide a breakdown as to how you spent your Freebie points.

[Longes]

1 hour ago, Scarecrow71 said:

@Longes

 

I cannot reconcile your Attributes, Skills (Knowledges), Backgrounds, Virtues...pretty much all the dots.  Please re-check the rules thread - especially for Attributes - and then provide a breakdown as to how you spent your Freebie points.

Adjusted.

Re:Attributes - IMHO, it'd be much more intuitive if you wrote "attributes 0/2/4"

 

Freebie breakdown:

Influence 0-3 -> 3

Conscience 2-3 -> 2

Willpower 4-9 -> 5

[Scarecrow71]

@Longes

 

Yeah, I should have probably gone 0/2/4.  But, que sera, and all.  Anyhow, your Abilities are still off.  You've got 6 dots in Skills, and 8 in Knowledges.  You've got the right number in Talents (13), but I think you may have taken one from Knowledges and dropped it into Skills by mistake?  Beyond that, I've got some questions!

1. What is your native language, and what languages do you have picked up for Multi-Lingual?
2. Specialties!  You need to identify Specialties for every Ability at a score of 3 or higher.  I'm especially interested here in Occult, primarily due to his involvement with the Church.
3. What happened with Felix?  How much money did he lose?  Why does he blame Albert?  Is this simply just a case of mistaken motives?  Or is something deeper happening here?
4. Resources of 5?  For a church figure?  I know the Church was corrupt in the middle ages, but Resources of 5 means you are effectively a nation unto yourself.  You can sway the fate of sovereign countries with a pen-stroke due to the amount of money you control, and you probably have more than most titular figures (and I'm talking about Kings/Queens/Emperors here).  I'm not opposed to having this level of money, but it is rather high.  And you have zero Retainers with that amount of money?

All told, looks good so far.  I'm intrigued by the Church angle here, especially as far as how high up in the Church this guy is and what tomes he might already have access to.  Just need you to clean up the Abilities and then answer the questions!

[Longes]

@Scarecrow71

Moved Etiquette point to Theology.

1. Native: Venetian. Multi-Lingual: Germanic, Arabic, Slavic (+Latin from Literate). I'm not sure how granular you go with languages, so this is open to discussion.

2. Listed below. The way I imagine it, Albert isn't especially "heretical" by the monk standards. He believes in alchemy and numerology, and practices the latter to supplement his financial dealings. He's a "wow, this guy hangs out in the library in his spare time" guy, not "wow, this guy was drawing a pentagram in the courtyard last night" guy.

3. I don't have any hard quantifications I can provide. I'm imagining it as a "living rent free in his head" kind of thing, where the actual losses are less important than the fact that Felix is eternally butthurt about getting a bad deal. It wounded his pride as a merchant, and he'll bear this grudge to his grave. Like a dwarf.

4. Yeah

Quote

Gerald of Wales would at times recount a story, how the monks of St. Swithin of Winchester together with their prior prostrated themselves in the mud before Henry II and complained to him with tears and lamentations that Bishop Richard whom they had as their head in lieu of an abbot, had deprived them of three dishes. And when the king inquired how many dishes were left them, they replied “ten.” “And I,” said the king, “am content in my court with three. Perish your bishop, if he does not reduce your dishes to the number of mine!”

San Giorno was a popular meeting place for major foreign dignitaries including popes and emperors, so I imagine the hustle can flow. It's all about that sigma monk grindset 😂. More seriously, Kings/Queens/Emperors probably have most of their power tied in real estate, military, administrative apparatus, and other non-monetary but formidable things. Incidentally, the monastic wealth isn't even the question of corruption. They weren't skimming government money - they were a parallel structure onto themselves with their own lands and money.

As for Retainers, I see them as a closer tie figures than simple hirelings. Alfreds and Robins and such. Albert almost certainly has some retinue with him on the journey to Castle Giovanni, but no one that'd be a supporting character.

But the biggest point is that I think it'd be more interesting to acquire a ghoul during the game rather than come with a pre-built one.

 

Specialties

Talents: Expression (Conversation), Leadership (Compelling), Subterfuge (Lies)

Skills: Commerce (Negotiation)

Knowledges: Occult (Research), Seneschal (Economics)

Edited May 29, 2022 by Longes (see edit history)

[Scarecrow71]

4 minutes ago, Longes said:

I'm not sure how granular you go with languages, so this is open to discussion.

What I'm really looking for on languages is whether or not you'll be able to communicate with the NPC's in the story.  Which I think you've got covered...except how is Latin your native language?  Being from Venice, shouldn't your native/born speaking language be Venetian, with Latin having been picked up later in life?

[Longes]

1 minute ago, Scarecrow71 said:

What I'm really looking for on languages is whether or not you'll be able to communicate with the NPC's in the story.  Which I think you've got covered...except how is Latin your native language?  Being from Venice, shouldn't your native/born speaking language be Venetian, with Latin having been picked up later in life?

Yeah, that's why I was asking about granularity. Since I think at the time Italian and Venetian just became distinguished from Vulgar Latin.

We can say that native is Venetian and replace Hebrew with Latin.

[Scarecrow71]

1 minute ago, Longes said:

Yeah, that's why I was asking about granularity. Since I think at the time Italian and Venetian just became distinguished from Vulgar Latin.

We can say that native is Venetian and replace Hebrew with Latin.

I would be good with Vulgar Latin...but that's not what the Church uses.  If you wanted to keep Vulgar Latin and then add Latin to the learned side, I'm good with that.  That would short you a language (technically), but it wouldn't be that far of a stretch.  But if you want to go Venetian native and Latin vs. Hebrew, I'm good with that too.  The game is going to span several hundred years, so there might be time to learn new languages.