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§ 08Character

The Eleven Backgrounds

Character archetypes — your starting role in Solace, the +1/−1 tier modifier, your signature item, your hooks, and your perk. Each Background has its own catalogue page.

All eleven Backgrounds assume you are green — recently certified, with only a handful of Path-walks under your belt. The campaign is about your character growing into the multiverse alongside you.

Each Background defines:

  • Company status — your declared posture toward Solace at session zero (True Believer, Skeptic, Captive, Lifer, Contractor, Unclassified)
  • Tier modifier — most apply +1 in one Domain and −1 in another; the Anomaly applies none
  • Signature item options — three concrete possibilities you pick from
  • Hook prompts — three or four candidate questions your character is reaching for
  • A perk — one small mechanical edge specific to the archetype

The full prose, perk text, signature item options, and hook prompts for every Background live in the catalogue.

Open the Backgrounds catalogue

Quick selection guide

  • The Junior Surveyor — Core-born, fresh certification, believes in the work (or did, until Out)
  • The Native Recruit — Path opened on your home world; you came back through it as a Solace asset
  • The Defector — Came to Solace from somewhere else, with a thing to leave behind
  • The Stranded — Lost your home world; Solace is the only Path back, if there is one
  • The Specialist — Deep narrow training (medic, archivist, linguist, engineer); Solace bought your expertise
  • The Mystic — Spirit-attuned before Solace found you; you knew about the Paths first
  • The Recovered — You returned from a place that should not have let you leave
  • The Smiling Functionary — Office-side career, pulled into the field with paperwork as armour
  • The Pathwalker — Outside Solace, you found a way to cross between worlds before; now you work for them
  • The Steward — Senior, quietly subversive; you keep the team alive against the metrics
  • The Anomaly — Unclassified. You don't quite fit any of the above. No perk, no tier mod — an unfinished sketch shaped by play
End of section · Doc P-08 · 15 sections total