Another day, another character for the #CharacterCreationChallenge. This is my first foray into the horror genre with a character from Delta Green.

Meet Linus Ingstrom – minor league hockey coach.

Yes, you read that right.

Linus played college hockey for Boston College and then kicked around for a few years in the minors. He was what you called a Goon – limited hockey skills but a willingness to fight and stick up for his teammates. He rarely put the biscuit in the basket.

The first time Linus started to realize there was something unnatural going on was at the end of a game.

Third period, down 5-1, Linus needed to do something to pump up his sagging team. He challenged the other team’s tough guy and they started trading blows at center ice. It was just for a moment, but he saw something in the other player’s eyes – something otherworldly. It sucked the energy from his very soul and made him feel a fear he had never felt before.

He immediately went down, getting pummeled by the other guy. He was completely unnerved.

A Delta Green agent who had been at the game, tracking down this unnatural presence, took note and started keeping tabs on Linus.

Linus has since seen the same thing in other fighters’ eyes in the heat of a game – a momentary flash of something inhuman. Every time, the Delta Green agent was there in the stands.

That agent was impressed by the Linus’ ability to keep going and eventually reached out to him. Someone with a strong will and even stronger punch could prove useful.

Linus now coaches in the lowest levels of the minors, keeping an eye out for the strange and sinister. Delta Green calls on him from time to time to lend a hand.

His dufflebag is always packed and ready to go. He’ll ask his mom to watch the kids (he got full custody, and you can imagine what the mother must have been like for that to happen) and puts his assistant coach in charge of the team until his return.

Delta Green

This is a game that references Lovecraftian horror, but feels more like the X Files to me. Although I’ve read some Lovecraft in the past, it never did much for me – for some reason reading horror doesn’t connect with my emotions in any way.

That’s a “me” thing.

Character building starts out like many popular RPGs – the standard six attributes scored between 3-18. In my case, the online dice roller I’ve been using gave me great rolls. I actually lowered a couple scores because he came out too good in everything. He still feels a bit overpowered to me.

When it came to skills, you start with your profession to establish some baselines. In my case, I already knew I wanted him to be a hockey guy, and there wasn’t anything close. That gave me the chance to create a custom profession, which I found to be quite easy: 400 points across 10 skills, keeping them between 30 and 60.

I then used the Athletics package for the custom attribute bonuses since it matched up with what I was going with.

I like the idea of documenting the distinguishing features for your weaknesses and strengths, since it gives you some good roleplay material. The bonds provide the same, and I’m looking forward to seeing how they’d play at the table.

Sanity is a big piece of this and other horror-type RPGs. The idea being that constantly facing bizarre phenomena is going to cause some mental issues eventually. That’s something that was missing in the X Files (which I am currently bingeing and, yes, I looked up how to spell that) – Muldur and Scully saw some crazy shtuff and… just kept moving on. I guess there were a couple minor shake ups, but nothing that really lingered.

I will be watching a bit of the Glass Cannon Network’s Actual Play of Delta Green to get a better feel for how this game works. I went with the Agents Guide and Handlers Guide bundle to learn the rules. A lot more reading to do, and I think you really need a table that can handle horrific scenarios – even just to get through the rulebooks – but looks like another interesting game to bring out.

Someday.