In the last two posts we talked about the plan and built two warring factions. Today we make our spy.
I needed a character. Looking at the Spycraft book the “race/class” combo is divided into agency (which part of the organisation you work for) and class (except its jobs specific to spy movie tropes like conman, car driver, heavy weapons etc). As I usually do when doing solo characters I randomly determined by assigning each agency and class a number and rolling for it. I got “Wetworks” for my agency and “Faceman” for my class. Reading the descriptions of both in the book I got the vibe that this unique combo meant that whoever my character was, they were all about deep undercover work with the end goal of murder and assassination. I also rolled for male/female gender identity with 50% for each and got a male.
I spent the day and thought about what kind of person this agent of ORCHID would be. Something that always bothered me about the usual spy heroes was that they were usually very blatantly caucasian. If my character was going to be a successful conman pretending to be any number of international roles I couldn’t envisage that being very effective. My mind kept coming back to the striking image of Yul Brynner in The King and I. I don’t know if they did anything to his skin to “asian him up,” but that dark olive/brown leathery tone was so ambiguous with his features. The sharp eyes, the chiselled cheeks. He could be any race. His origin could be chinese, or just as equally a romani “gypsy”, or even indian or middle eastern. I didn’t even know myself where he was from and had to look it up. But that was the kind of unidentifiable vibe I wanted for my character. I thought of the kinds of backstory that would produce such a person.
I liked the idea of some kind of romani traveller, and a part of me was thinking about the British colonisation of India. I’m trying to work out how someone of such mixed heritage gets caught up in the spy business and I think growing up in the right circles as the child of some kind of Indian servant working for a British colonist seems very fitting, albeit culturally problematic. However I believe that gives a base for how he can learn the way of both the gentry and the working class and fit in with both as needed.
Time for a name. I raid the spice section of my local grocers and find “Mace” and as I am paying behind the counter is a price list for deli meats. Mace Devon, no better, I come up with Mace Devlin. Now with the ideas in my head I generate a bunch of AI images for concept art to try and get my mind going.
I use the book to create the stats for our hero. My goal when making this is to focus significantly on social encounters so I keep my disguise and sense motives up and try to consider what kinds of challenges I am going to face as we get gaming. I split his skills as evenly as I can to make him an allrounder. I feel like I am not really well equipped looking at these stats. I am level 1 though so keep that in mind.
I do the questions in the booklet and try to answer them. The character sheet and answers can be seen below. **Note: in the absence of a fillable spycraft 1.0 character sheet I have used roll20’s Stargate SG1 character sheet. The system is an expansion of spycraft 1.0 and has skills such as xenolinguistics etc that are not appropriate for a 1960s spycraft game. Please ignore the discrepancies where required.**
3 traits agent has: Witty, Deceptive, Merciless
3 traits agent doesn’t like in others: Compassion, Second Chances, Shortsightedness, too many people he knows have been hurt again and again by those who have given others a second chance due to compassionate reasons.
Where/when born? Born in Sringeri, Kashmir in 1942. (27 years old)
Ideal agent’s specialty. Mace Devlin thrives on blending in and noticing details that others miss. He is also highly apathetic to others emotions making it easier for him to do the work required of him.
What does the agent look like? Mace Devlin has an ambiguous appearance, multicultural in nature. His eyes are striking and could easily belong to any race. His skin, a deep olive/brown, smooth and well preserved. He is fit and of average height.
Does agent have quirks? Mace uses a Colt M1911 pistol that he received as a gift from a US Air Force Captain during the Korean War. Mace prefers to wear clothes the colour navy blue where possible, this has led to him having the code name of “Blue Iris” Iris being a flower that symbolises death.
What does your agent love most? Mace likes to be on the hunt. His favourite thing is the thrill of playing a long con.
Fave things?
Book – Night of the Hunter – Davis Grubb
Movie/show – Marnie, Alfred Hitchcock
Colour – Navy Blue
Possession – A compass his father gave him.
Genre of fiction/period – Psychological thrillers
Leisure time activity – crosswords
Food – Bulgogi (Korean Style BBQ) from his time in Korea
Drink – Mango Lassi
Car model – Lancia Aurelia
Weapon – Colt M1911
Clothing Type – Loose clothing, preferably asian cuts such as Bandhgalas, or Baji.
Most important event? When Mace was just a boy he witnessed his father be beaten by a British noble who was drunk and high on opium. This resulted in the young boy being confronted with the harsh realities of institutional racism at a young age. He held authority of all kinds in great disrespect for a long time, and actively sought to cause issues that “buck the system” as he grew up.
Feelings re espionage? – After his service as a mercenary in the Korean War, Mace found that espionage and diplomacy roles were vital in many of his friends surviving. India actively sought to bring peace treaties during the war in Korea and doing so often involved use of intelligence as leverage.
Why live a life of lies? Mace doesn’t trust any institution to uphold a noble stance. He has seen time and time again that power corrupts and he wants to see that sort of thing brought down. Truth is subjective, what matters is who is being hurt and how that malice is happening.
Motivation? Mace ideally wants to end suffering. He doesn’t like governments playing proxy wars. He doesn’t like colonisers who take advantage of the forgiveness of others. And he wants to try to even the playing field as much as possible.
Family? Mace has a father of Indian descent who served as a manservant for a british diplomat until the Raj leaderships ended. He also has a mother who was a romani who had come to the diplomat trying to scam him out of his wealth. Mace has several half-brothers and sisters who are of Romani descent to other fathers.
Personal views? Religion and Politics are both tools for controlling people. They also can be used to your advantage to get what you want.
Alright, enough of this nonsense. Time to get to some action. Session 1 starts next post!
