Characters created for the Dungeons & Dragons franchise can be converted, regardless of the iteration, with a quick follow-through of this checklist. Most of the steps are one-way, however, as doing so is departing a leveled-based experience-pool, Hit Pont Pool, and Modifier-poll process that does not directly match with Passages.
1. Character name will become the Persona Name. The player IS the Persona, compared to the Character that the player 'plays'. So, the values we create that define your persona are more than emblematic, they are measurable, definable numeric values that define the Persona.
2. The idea of 'Saving Throws' is reimagined. Now these numbers are called the "Base", and equates to the Base in the creation process for a Passages Persona.
A Persona has a Foundation, built upon foundations. While they are somewhat analogous to Attributes, they are not synonymous.
- Intelligence and Wisdom combined approximate equivalence to Brilliance in Passages. Add them together to get your BRILLIANCE.
- Wisdom and Charisma combined approximate equivalency to Cognizance in Passages. Add them together to get your COGNIZANCE
- Dexterity and Strength combined approximate equivalence to Grace in Passages. Add them together to get your GRACE.
- Intelligence and Charisma combined approximate equivalence to Presence in Passages. Add them together to get your PRESENCE
- Strength and Constitution combined approximate equivalence to Resilience in Passages. Add them together to get your RESILIENCE.
- Wisdom and Constitution combined approximate equivalence to Resolve. Add them together to get your RESOLVE.
If you think about it, the process increases your numeric values across the board. This is one way you are becoming MORE.
Like Saving Throws, the Foundations of Persona provide the Director a means to give a player an "out" if things get out of hand. Unlike Saving Throws, the players depend more on their particular skills to avoid adverse Conditions, Consequences, or Results.
3. The race of your character may remain if you are playing a standard character race, but the Racial Modifiers and other numbers don't. Coordinate with your Director to determine what Race your Persona should be. Look them up under Races of Nycos, and choose skills from those for your NycosRPG Race. For each, choose 6 racial traits. These are unique and unfortunately can only be considered again in pretty specific conditions, so make the best of it.
4. Place is a new feature, so check through the variety of cultures for the one that suits you. Then take two skills you wish from Place, too.
5. Next are the various Intital motives, called Estates. Choose skills equal to your Foundation's Core from whichever list or lists you wish, representing what your initial motivations are.
6. Next are the Ways of life in the Passages. Look through the various Ways. Once you have an idea of the Ways and what they represent, choose your Foundation's BASE Value of Points in Skills from the Ways lists. Once you have chosen those, choose a number of thes chosen skills equal to your character's level, and add that level to each of them, to represent the advancement you made before the conversion. Remember, you can put more than one point into a SKill. It might feel like it is O.P. to have only a few skills and ratchet them up this way, but really it's okay... the maximum any one skill can achieve is 95., so even high-level characters will have a challenge maxing out, and if they did, they would be functionally destitute in terms of other things they could do beyond that one or two...
So, to review.
- We have gone through Base. That created the foundation for the Persona, and the basis for all Skills are listed with their description.
- We have converted Levels into Skills, in terms of their starting values and the sheer quantity of Skills one can begin with. Your Persona will no longer have a 'Level"
- We have gone through Race, again converting the Racial Traits the Persona has.
- We have introduced Place, deciding on the cultural background of the Persona.
- We have introduced Estates, capturing skills based on the initial motive for the Persona
- We have converted, in essence, the concepts of Class to the wider variety of Ways one might have developed, and opened a nearly infinite field of Skills the Persona can develop.
Now for the tough part. we are eliminating the concepts of Hit Points, Armor Class values, and Experience Points as you know them. We are not renaming them, reskinning them, or maintaining them at all. They are gone.
Instead, the Persona has a track that represents the whole of consciousness, a track that represents the whole of life force. Both are merely representations of the percentage of full health and awareness, and as actions, injuries, and time itself pass by, the Persona gains and loses these values as a means of expressing the pressures that life can be under based on conditions, consequences, and results of happenstance, intent, and the outcome of those actions.
