Bektas - Level 1 peasant
Vitals
| VIT | d4 | HEA | 10 / 10 | |
| FIN | d6 | GRT | 20 / 20 | |
| INS | d12 | DR | 0 | |
| FRV | d8 | |||
Background
The vast majority of Constantinople’s population are peasants—poor workers with few rights, no land holdings, and limited social mobility. Members of this class make their living through hard manual labor as farmers, in construction, or producing raw goods such as beeswax or textiles. On both sides of the city, peasants live, crammed into tenement housing and are levied with high rents and taxes—payable either in cash or in kind (with livestock, foodstuff, raw goods, etc.)—in exchange for their housing and for their safety within the city. Peasants are further mandated to serve as soldiers whenever the city comes under attack—either from hordes of demoniacs or invading armies—with many receiving cursory training in polearms and archery.
Due to a lifetime of poverty and hard labor, peasants are robust, physically tough, and resourceful. Pilgrims from the peasant class have access to a wide array of powers centered around combat, survival, and mutual aid.
Humour - Choleric (yellow bile) 🜂
Governed by Mars and the sun, cholerics are most associated with summer and fire. Seen as driven and ambitious by those around them, cholerics tend to be high-achieving and strong-willed. Yet the choleric can also be impatient, pushy, and prone to anger when things do not go their way.
Strong-willed (free)
Whenever you roll INS to resist a charm check, you can burn 2 GRT to roll with advantage.
Crime - Apostasy
Religious authority is fragile and jealously guarded in post-Abandonment Constantinople. The old texts and prophets did not predict—and cannot explain—the onset of the Abandonment. This confusion has caused a crisis of faith, leading some—especially within the middle classes, influenced by humanist philosophy from Italy by way of Venetian and Genoese traders, or from the courts of Baghdad and points further east—to renounce their religion, becoming apostates (renouncers, those who leave their faith).
Both the Ulema and the Patriarchate of Constantinople consider apostasy to be a major crime. Both institutions are quick to arrest alleged defectors in sweeping inquisitions, to be handed over to the Canticum. Most apostates only share their ideas within tight social circles and salons, knowing that exposure and public accusation are tantamount to exile.
Apostate (passive)
Having been found guilty of apostasy, you make all FRV/charm checks targeting NPCs marked as clergy or nobility with disadvantage.
Powers
Basic herbalism (10-minute)
You are familiar with commonly found medicinal herbs and plants. Burn 3 GRT to make a standard (6+) INS check, seeking out remedies you may recognize: if successful, you gain enough herbs to quickly craft d4 vital poultices (each allows you to recover d4 HEA).
Sawyer (passive)
When making a VIT/attack check using an axe weapon, add +1.
Hoi polloi (passive)
You are the salt of the earth and well-liked by other peasants. When making a FRV/charm check targeting other peasants, add +1.
Maleficia (3/8)
Grotesque scurs [1/3]
Small, malformed horns jut out at random from your head and face.
Drawback: You cannot wear normal helms.
LVL 1 (standard)
You can headbutt as a bludgeoning attack, making a VIT/attack roll, inflicting d4 + dVIT damage plus bleed 1.
Barbed quills [1/3]
Thousands of small, barbed quills grow across your body, starting with your back.
Drawback: You cannot wear normal armour.
LVL 1 (free)
Whenever you grapple with an opponent, burn 2 GRT to force your opponent to make a standard (6+) FIN check. If they fail, they are stabbed by your quills, which inflict d3 damage plus bleed 1.
Snake skin [1/3]
Your skin is composed of smooth, overlapping scales, like a snake’s. Your skin molts and sheds once every week. Your smooth and flexible scales make precision movements easier.
Drawback: None.
LVL 1 (passive)
Gain +1 to FIN/dodge and FIN/initiate checks.
Equipment
Silver: 0
Inventory (7/7)
| Name | Type | Description | Slots |
|---|---|---|---|
| Quillon dagger | Short blade | A common short dagger with a simple crossguard. Especially effective at finding gaps in armour. Inflicts d2 + dFIN damage, ignoring DR. | 1 |
| Rations | Food | Preserved foods: typically manchette bread, dried fruit, pickled vegetables, and nuts. | 1 |
| Waterskin | Drink | A tanned bladder containing potable water. Consume to gain d2 GRT (not exceeding max). | 1 |
| Theriac salve | Medicine | A small pot of ointment made of 70 fermented herbs, viper flesh, and opium. Consume to regain 2d4 pool. | 1 |
| Torch | Light source | A length of wood with a bundle of oil-soaked rags fastened to its end. Creates a 30-foot radius of light for 2 hours. | 1 |
| Iron and flint firestarter | Tool | Produces sparks to ignite a flame when struck together. Required to ignite fires and light sources. | 1 |
| Rope | Tool | A length of woven hempeb rope 50 feet long. | 1 |