Starport Scum includes a few ways of doing things.
If we're building a character, we could just write down a few words to describe them.
Our character is a bounty hunter with an EAGLE EYE and was trained as a MECHANIC in the military.
His blaster pistol PACKS A PUNCH.
Boom. Done.
But if you want to get a bit more involved, there's the dice and random tables so let's break those out.
We're going to build a random Hero class character.
Step 1: Our timeline.
Three dice rolls tell us that our guy got a decent job after growing up. Things were going great and he found the meaning of life but a terrible accident ended it all.
We'll figure that his farm on one of the frontier colonies was burned to the ground and being flat broke, our disillusioned gun slinger sets out for adventure.
Step 2: Traits
We need some Traits to set him up. We'll give him 3.
The character focus is going to be Technical, which means the first and third trait will be in that category, while the second can be anything else.
I'll give him BITTER SURVIVOR as a player created trait. I imagine it might give him a bonus die when trying to avoid dying from things.
For technical traits, I roll on the table in the book, earning FIXER and HACKER, giving bonus dice to repairing things and intruding on things.
A roll on the starting gear table gives us some peculiar clothing, maybe an old scarf he always used to wear on the farm, kept as a memento.
Lastly, I roll on the Gun table in the loot chapter of the rules to see if we've got some firepower and get a Officer's Sword. Well, fair enough but how the heck did he get that?
I decide that this is an unexplored character trait. It's not actually his but he's holding on to it.
If our campaign ends up encountering someone interesting, it'll let us add in an old friend (or enemy).
Step 3: Some hired help.
Can't take on the galaxy alone, so we throw in two goons.
Goons are just guys with guns. No particular skills or talents. We roll twice on the Goon table for a bit of flavour earning us a mercenary and a security guard.
I guess they're just some paid help that will add a bit of firepower.
Step 4: Putting it all together.
Goons get 2 dice when firing, 1 die when moving and these guys have basic guns and no armour from the start.
I figure since they're hired muscle, I can get away with giving them 1 die of armour, due to wearing a helmet or something.
Our main guy has a standard slug pistol, his sword for close encounters and is wearing normal farm clothes.
He'll roll 3 dice when firing, 4 dice hand to hand and 4 dice when hacking or fixing things.
Not too bad and the entire process took maybe 4 minutes to go through.
rediscovers his Scrunts.
