Secondary character

Secondary Character Option
When your primary character is unable to be a part of a scene, you can still participate by playing a secondary character. No one likes being left out of the game. This option allows you to still be a part of the action. For example, you are the only non-Human in your guild, and the group must infiltrate a Human-supremacist organisation. For this scene, the Game Master may allow you to play one of the guild's hired muscle. Experience in this circumstance is awarded to the player—which may be applied to either character as he or she sees fit. However, the experience award to the player may not be as large as it otherwise would be if the primary character were played. Additional experience may be given to the secondary character to reflect the experience. Needless to say, additional modifications to the character, such as skills learned or monies gained, stay with that secondary character, not the player or his primary character. Remember that a secondary character should still be played as a real person, with the same fears, dreams, and needs. They are not merely 'flushable' characters.

An optional use of secondary characters is the communal pool method. Communal secondary characters have no special tie to any one player. That is, a secondary character may be played by one person this game session, and someone else next time. This option is best suited for characters that are part of a large group, such as townspeople in the local village, and is less desirable for a knight's squire to be available to everyone. For example, the non-player hirelings of a guild may all be considered part of a communal pool. This would allow, for example, a player whose primary character is severely injured to participate as the guild blacksmith. This way the player can still have a 'voice' in the game world and may still continue to enjoy the game. Communal characters are an additional roleplaying challenge—even more so than playing your own secondary character. It is important when playing communal characters to remember to be true to that character. In other words, try and play that character consistently with their personality, instead of what amuses you at the time. For example, if Bildr the smith is a surly, stingy, loudmouth, don't suddenly start playing him as sugary nice and friendly—giving your character his finest weapons and armour. Both of these optional uses of secondary characters involve the cooperation of the Game Master. This particular option also requires the cooperation of the other players.

"Lawyer: "… I leave my wine cellar and three crates of my finest whiskey." Hedge: "Really?" Lawyer: "And a boot to the head." Hedge: (Thump!) "Oh!" Lawyer: "… and another for Jenny and the wimp." Jenny: (Thump!) "Uh!" Hank: (Thump!) "Ow!""

- Frantics, Last Will and Temperament

Last Will and Testament
One option to help ensure that your property is left to the correct person or persons is to draft a will. This does not need to be the full legal document (the 'sound mind' bit wouldn't apply to most player characters anyway), but it does need to be noted somewhere. This can be a simple list—hand-written or posted on the forums—for example: tower-Simon Stylites, armour-Nabor of Argent, Sword of St. Quirinus-Genevieve, horse ranch and all gold-Anastasius, et cetera. A lazy way to divvy up your worldly possessions is to annotate the names next to the applicable items on your character sheet. The succinct will of the infamous Dwarf Harold Ingi the Avaricious simply stated, "Bury it all with me; I don't want to leave anyone or anything a damned penny…    ——Harold." A will will also serve to hand over all your goods to your legacy character, e.g. "Everything I own will belong to my nephew Basilides upon my death." The only two conditions that must be met for a will (for metagame purposes) are that it must have been written before death, and someone still living must know of it to enforce those final wishes. Logically, the legatee (or multiple beneficiaries) must be someone that you know, and want to have your personal effects. Having a written document, with the location known to a trusted associate or two, will allow your previous character's belongings to pass smoothly to your next. Without a final will and testament, you are at the mercies of your fellow player characters. Scary thought, isn't it? As your guildmates and 'friends' are likely already making a mental inventory of all your stuff, keep a copy of your will with a trusted syndic for safe keeping. The legalities of dispersion of property of the deceased without a will vary according to local and national laws and customs. In Formour, the closest living relative inherits in the absence of a will ('closest' in the genetic sense, rather than locational), with unclaimed capital, goods, estates, and other property reverting to the Crown if no heirs can be found or proven. Property dispersion isn't the only function of a final will. Instructions for the disposal of your remains, how you want the funeral to proceed, custody of your children, or any other final wishes you want handled can be included in your will. Try and keep things reasonable, if your character dies suddenly, don't expect a brand-new character (that none of the others have even heard of before—probably since it was just created) to walk in and claim all of the deceased's belongings. Nor would it be wise to expect your final wishes to be followed if they are beyond reason—remember that 'you' would no longer be there to enforce anything.

"The stronger that any light shines, the darker the shadows around him grow."

- Berserk

Legacy Characters
A legacy character may be either a secondary character—of any variety—or one created after the death of a primary character who has some tie to the deceased. This allows your new character to have some connection to the ongoing campaign. You may know some of the same information, have similar goals, inherit the decedent's property, and even share some backgrounds.

If the new player is related to the previous one, determine which backgrounds would be shared. These are automatic and need not be rolled (even the bad ones). These automatic shared backgrounds cannot be swapped out from the player's choice list. Roll 1D6 for the number of additional backgrounds for the new character, and randomly determine these normally; these may be swapped out or dropped normally. If any are inappropriate, or conflict with the 'legacy backgrounds', then they are ignored (not rerolled). How closely related the two characters are will determine which backgrounds are kept. For example, someone's twin will share all of the -blooded backgrounds, and will not have any additional ones of that variety, however a half-sibling may have one or more that is different, as one of the parents is not shared. A best friend from one's old marine unit will not have any direct genetic ties, but will share backgrounds such as Military Experience.

Experience Addendum
Most of the time it will be clear that experience for the player and character are synonymous. When in doubt, ask for clarity. As a guideline, experience gained for a character's actions stick with that character. Experience gained for metagame activities—such as an experience bounty for making a character sketch, or points awarded for helping out a new player—can be divvied up, or possibly even banked for a planned secondary character.

It should be noted that the Midian Dark Fantasy Roleplaying Game does not have guidelines for beginning a character at a level higher than first. This is a feature, not a bug. If your Game Master allows it (though many do) you can bank earned experience for an as-yet ungenerated character. This can hurt you in the long run, as any increased character levels do not have inherent skill improvements or other benefits of character advancement.

If you want to create a character with many life experiences, you don't need high levels. This is exactly why the experienced background was written.