Saturday, July 28, 2012

Cleric of Management

The recent infiltration of my career interests into my game playing interests has me thinking about how to stick a lawyer PC into a game - oh the possibility for terrible in jokes! In a plain OD&D game or a Gonzo science fantasy one this would be silly, I suppose on could have a robed and wigged barrister as a magic-user or thief, or even a barbarian trial by combat specialist who constantly referenced the arcane rules of his practice "Now, in a case of a simple murder the weapons have to be similar, and the defendant gets to choose.  Where reasonable suspicion exists and the the accuser has a history of blood-feud the Prosecutor will be armed with a two handed sword, and the Defendant a short sword."  Still I think that a more modern setting makes perfect sense for lawyer adventurers - they are often freelancers, can be involved with strange folk and sometimes must do their own investigating.  The most compelling modern fantasy setting I know is Weird Adventures.  Below we have an idea for a lawyer adventurer for Weird Adventures. 

Cincinnatus Klar - Cleric of Management
Cincinnatus  Klar
Novice Cleric

Strength - Average to Strong (due to inner conviction)
Intelligence - Slightly above Average
Wisdom - High but obsessive
Constitution - Below Average due to diet and lack of sleep
Dexterity - Average
Charisma - Average, attractive but oddly off-putting unless a devotee of "Management".


Cincinnatus "Cinch" Klar was a bright young man from a good family of Staarkish stock hailing from the steel league. He went to some of the better schools in the league and finally in the city.  Cincinnatus's education led him ultimately to the law, but Cincinnatus' bland career path following his older brother into the family machine parts business, working besides the family firm's elderly solicitor (Cinncinnatus's uncle Joheim) with the goal of letting the old man finally retire after learning the details of the trade was interrupted only a year after Cincinnatus recived his degree and was embarred in both the steel league and city.


The Klar family firm collapsed under the weight of unfulfillable, unfulfilled and canceled orders as shipments to their contacts in Metropolis stopped or were intercepted by Luddite sea raiders.  The company floundered on for only a few more months before collapsing under the weight of debt. 

Embittered and angry with Ealderde Cincinnatus volunteered with the Staark Grenadier corps at the age of 26.  While Cincinnatus' class and knowldege (principally his excellent command of Luddite) kept him from the front lines, he experienced enough of the horrors of the war to return a changed man.  Acting as a ad hoc prosecutor in the show trials of accussed Grande Ludd spies made him doubt the rightness of Staark's cause, while a pointless behind the lines raid by airdropped Luddite abdead soldiers and reality twisting madlight bombs on Cincinnatus' intelligence section that tramuatized him almost to the breaking point.

Cincinnatus' experience of the raid were strange in the extreme, caught on the edge of the mind effecting madlight explosions and watching the rampaging dead tear apart his fellows Cincinnatus was overwhelmed by a sense of the inherent wrongness and disorder of the world, the war and humanity.  Compared with the calm relentlessness of the machine parts that filled his youth and certainty of the orderly bureaucratic tasks that filled his days the fundamental chaos and disorder of the world was both wrong and offensive.  It wasn't the injustice of grisly death, that offended Cincinnatus, it was its random nature - a functioning universe would provide order even in death and each man would understand his lot and the reasons for his demise.  Somehow Cincinnatus was able to battle his way free of the raid's chaos, stepping purposefully past the raving abdead, who seemed to shrink from his presence and ignored him in favor of other victims.

Cincinnatus has never recovered from the raid, now perceiving the world as a broken machine, and having elected himself to aid in its repair and proper maintenance. He is an intense man, brittle and obsessive - so changed from the handsome gadabout that his devoted fiance left him weeks after his return for a life among the City's jazz clubs.  Cincinnatus remains attractive in a blond Staarkish way with square even features.  Now 29, Cincinnatus sometimes appears several years older, fine lines covering his face and his movements having brittle grace and body a strange frailness.  Cincinnatus' health has been poor since the war, though some doctors believe it to be an after effect of Luddite gas, most doctors ascribe his frailty to a lack of sleep and very poor diet (mostly saltines and black coffee).  He is also plagued by certain obsessive habits of cleanliness and proper behavior. Cincinnatus is  always scrubbing his hands and face after touching others and possesses a closet of identical dowdy tweed suits.

Returning to the City and setting himself up in private practice, his family lost to poverty, despair, suicide and illness, Cincinnatus has a small client base among businessmen and architects who find his methodical ability to work through bureaucratic obstacles almost uncanny.  His intense demeanor, strange staring eyes and exacting formal speech prevent close friendships and he refers to himself as Mr. Klar or Klar, Esquire almost exclusively these days. Still his precise formal politeness and dutiful obedience to all rules has won him a certain level of respect and camaraderie around the courthouse, especially amongst the clerks and clerical staff.

After the raid and since his return Cincinnatus has noticed that he has strange abilities, he can see falsehoods in documents (though not in the spoken word), is sometimes able to drive off unnatural or chaotic creatures, and has a preternatural ability to finish paperwork, forms and legal briefs as well as making sure they move through bureaucratic channels properly. Recently after witnessing a automobile accident Cincinnatus discovered that he is able to heal injuries caused by accidents or the result of non-state sanctioned violence by visualizing what would have befallen the victim is the world were "proper".  This ability frightened and elated him, and the night afterwards Cincinnatus was visited by a vision from the Eikon.  The spirit appeared  in the form of Cincinnatus' uncle Joheim the solicitor, now with a halo in the form of a glowing gear and his skin crawling with legal statute.  Cincinnatus was ripe for the revelation that he had been called to be an agent of orderly management of the world, and that his job was to further the the rule of law, bureaucracy and control by the status-quo.  Cincinnatus embraced the job of being an agent for management, keeping his low key practice going and now also reaching out to citizens who are plagued by disorder, pushing for access to the courts and proper integration into the cities bureaucracy for everyone.  He is always glad to stop and help a hobo file for an ID card, or encourage even the destitute to pay their proper taxes (or file for public assistance).  Disorder annoys and sadden Cincinnatus on a spiritual level and if he sees disorderly behavior he will try to stop it with the minimal amount of force, report it to the proper authorities and try to aid the victims by assisting them in preparing the proper paperwork for reparations or civil damages.

Lately he has found a willing audience among some of the City's Eisenmenschen veterans who Cincinnatus encourages to file for reparations from the Staarkish government and attempts to help find public assistance for job training. He also discourages them from joining extremist groups of all kinds and to work only through the proper legal channels. Cincinnatus is equally offended by criminality and the Hell-Syndicate (Not that they exist - hell is orderly and well managed) but that the syndicate gets away with flouting the City's laws regularly. 


In addition to his job and charity related activities (though he always demands at least token pay) Cincinnatus finds himself desiring to take his fight directly against the dark entities of chaos that he sees as threats to the ordered expansion of the City's bureaucracy and would even go so far as to strap on his old service pistol and explore antediluvian ruins with the goal of forcing otherworldy intruders back into their "proper" universes.  Cincinnatus feels that if he is able to aid in the maintenance of an orderly world his own disorders will subside and his health and peace will return.

3 comments:

  1. You should check out the offensive locution rules in the Ready Ref Sheets if you have not seen them.

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    1. I haven't seen that - I've seen the Judge's Guild legal system - but I wasn't especially impressed and I think it would be more fun to run the trial itself.

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  2. Ha! I missed this the other day. I like it. :)

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