So, as it turns out, suddenly waking up in a very different body is really fucking weird. The first thing Alex noticed as he regained consciousness-he is very glad he decided to sit on the couch or else he’d probably be bruised on top of everything else-is that his skin felt...heavy, for lack of a better word. It felt like he was wearing some kind of full-body armor over his skin, but at the same time it was his skin? Very confusing to say the least. That and his sense of touch seemed to have dulled somewhat now.
Oh, good! You’re awake. I am proud to announce that there were no complications in applying Character Creation changes to your form. How do you feel?
“I feel like I just had the best night’s sleep ever, and also like everything is a couple inches to the right of where it should be...somehow. Wow I’m glad I decided against having a tail, that would have just been way too much on top of everything else right now.” Alex pats at his arms with newly clawed fingers, before slowly feeling around his face. The new skull shape will take getting used to as well, he’s just thankful that his ability to speak doesn’t seem to have been affected. He gets up and almost immediately trips at the new length of his legs, cursing under his breath before asking Lucy a question as he starts to get a feel for his new body. “Alright, while I try to get used to all...this, I think you mentioned something about skills before I went under?”
Indeed! Skills are rewarded when an individual accomplishes some kind of effect multiple times. After all, it’s not much of a skill if you can’t reliably repeat the effect you want, is it? Skills themselves serve multiple purposes, most of which are dependent on the Skills in question. In general though, Skills can be divided into four groups, Combat Skills, Utility Skills, Support Skills, and Crafting Skills.
Alex speaks up before she can continue typing, slowly stretching his limbs to get in tune with their new lengths. “I’m guessing Combat Skills are for direct fighting, Utility Skills are for useful things that benefit the person using them, Support is the same as Utility but for other people, and Crafting is about Skills for making stuff?”
Yep, you’ve got it pretty much in one. Although some Skills are counted in two or more groups, depending on how they are used. For example, Knife Mastery is just as much a Combat Skill for an assassin as it is a Crafting Skill for a cook. Furthermore, depending on the Skills you have, you can become eligible to obtain one or more Classes. Classes in turn can make it easier to learn new skills related to the Class, among other benefits. In fact, the Class section is the last portion of the Character Creation section, right after Skill Review.
Now about as comfortable with his new form as he can get in just a few minutes, Alex crosses his arms and looks at his new companion. “Alright then, what’s the verdict, Lucy? If I remember correctly things that I’m good at up until now should be counted for these Skills, right?”
Correct! Considering you are an engineer it’s not much of a surprise that a good chunk of your skills are Crafting-focused, though there were a few surprises I wasn’t expecting.
Mechanical Engineering [Crafting]: Journeyman Skinning [Utility/Crafting]: Novice Coding [Crafting]: Journeyman Fishing [Utility]: Novice Electrical Engineering [Crafting]: Apprentice Cooking [Utility/Support]: Novice Robotics [Crafting/Support/Combat]: Apprentice Housework [Utility]: Novice Blueprinting [Crafting]: Apprentice Gardening [Crafting/Utility]: Beginner Blacksmithing [Crafting]: Apprentice Painting [Crafting]: Beginner Shooting (Rifle) [Combat/Utility]: Apprentice Woodworking [Crafting]: Beginner
There are other Skills of course, like Reading (English) and Writing (English), but I excluded Skills that are obvious for your day-to-day survival and don’t have any particular Class qualifiers related to them.
After looking over the list for a few moments, Alex looks at Lucy’s text box with a skeptical raised brow as he speaks. “Not that this isn’t a pretty solid judgment about a lot of the skills I’ve learned, but it doesn’t seem all that...medieval and magic-y, you know what I mean? Heck, the only reason I probably have Blacksmithing is because I used to dabble in it with my dad.”
Well, the world isn’t very medieval anymore, is it? Wouldn’t really be fair to just ignore the modern solutions and skills that would otherwise not be included. And have you done anything magical yet? It wouldn’t really make sense for you to have Skills in something you don’t know how to do.
Alex thinks it over before shrugging, that being good enough reasoning for him. “Alright, that’s fair. So, Classes are next and then this whole ‘Character Creation’ thing is done, right? I’ve got to say, I’m actually kind of excited now.” Maybe it was just the feeling of being in a new body, or maybe it was because he was a bit hysterical with all the new things going on, but he felt a bit like he’d had a few cups of coffee too many.
Yep, then you can go back to whatever you were doing before. Classes are classifications made by the System to give benefits to individuals on a broader scope than just Skills and Abilities, the same way that a job or passion usually has a broader scope than a single skill. This includes things like Soldier (Modern), Engineer, Witch, Summoner, and other such things. The general rule is that a class could be applied to multiple people, but only some people have it thanks to their own long-term efforts. Subclasses are similar to Classes in that they are exactly the same thing. The main difference is that when a Class is put in a Subclass slot, you only gain some of the benefits or lesser versions of them, rather than the full benefits. You have 1 Class slot and 2 Subclass slots to use, and you currently have these Classes available. Classes and Subclasses can be rearranged at any time.
Engineer (General):
Stolen story; please report.
As Class: Moderate quality boost to engineered items, Small increase to blueprinting and engineering Skills.
As Subclass: Small quality boost to engineered items.
Engineer (Robotics):
As Class: Moderate quality boost to robotic creations, Small increase to computer science and electromechanical Skills.
As Subclass: Small quality boost to robotic creations.
Hunter (Modern):
As Class: Moderate quality boost to hunted prey resources, Small increase to tracking, trapping, and shooting Skills.
As Subclass: Small quality boost to hunted prey resources.
Craftsman (Hobbyist):
As Class: Moderate quality boost to all crafted items below Above Average quality grade, Small increase to [Crafting] skills of Novice level or lower.
As Subclass: Small quality boost to all crafted items below Above Average quality grade.
Reading the choices and their benefits over, Alex looks at Lucy skeptically. “These are nice, but don’t they seem kinda...same-y? I would have thought there would be more to them.” You wouldn’t think a flat screen could radiate smugness, but Lucy still managed it somehow.
Of course there is! Why don’t you try putting three of them in the Class slots, see what happens?
Rolling his eyes at the screens dramatics, Alex does as she says, deciding to put Engineer (Robotics) in the Class slot with Engineer (General) and Craftsman (Hobbyist) in the Subclass slots. With a little flash of light and a fancy little jingle, the Class screen gains a glowing outline as a new screen section slides out.
Class-Subclass Synergy: Casual Roboticist
While active, designing robots from lower-quality materials becomes much easier to accomplish, with a higher overall success rate.
See? Told you. Class-Subclass Synergy-or CSS-gives specific benefits depending on the classes you have equipped. Since you have Engineering (Robotics) as your Class, and Craftsman (Hobbyist) as a Subclass, the ‘make better things from lesser materials & Skills’ part of the Subclass augments your Class. The Engineering (General) Class mostly just boosts that effect.
Scratching his chin in thought, Alex looks over the new information approvingly. “Yeah, that seems like it could be very useful. Especially if you get the right classes to synergize together, like if you had something like Craftsman (Magic) or something like that as your main Class and then used some kind of specialized magic user Classes for the Subclass options. So, we’re done then?”
Yep!
Character Creation Complete. Have Fun!
With that, everything seems to just restart. The T.V turns on and flips through a few channels now that the remote signals have finally caught up to it, the birds outside start singing and flying around again, and Maria is moving down the street once more. Although, looking at her closer...Yep, those are rabbit ears on her head. And rabbit-like legs. Wow, she is really taking off down the street now. She must have taken some kind of speed Ability or something, I guess.
He sighs in relief before turning the T.V to the nearest news channel, going to the kitchen to make something small to eat while he listens to the ‘breaking news’ that everything has gone crazy (The news anchor is now an elf, from the looks of it, what a suprising choice). Apparently this is indeed a world-wide thing, and everyone has gotten about the same experience in the Character Creator, as far as anyone can tell in the first few minutes. Lucy has been mostly watching the T.V too as Alex cooks, though ‘watching’ is a bit of a misnomer since she doesn’t have eyes.
The real breaking news comes up just as he finishes making some bacon and eggs and sets it down on the table in front of the couch to eat. Apparently the Pyramids of Giza are floating now, somehow, a few people are even livestreaming it right now. Along with the floods of pictures of other stretches of land either bursting into flame, becoming entirely crystal or metal, or a number of other things, Alex slowly turns to Lucy and just gives her a long, deadpan stare. Eventually the screen finally gives in and starts explaining.
Okay, yeah, a few tiny things may have changed with the introduction of the System. But it isn’t their fault, it kind of just happened! Heck, they’re having a hard enough time consolidating the rips in space-time into something people can deal with-uuuhhh I mean nothing is wrong, you have nothing to worry about!
Alex decides he just can’t right now, pinching his nose-er, snout?-and deciding to put that info to the side for now. “I’m going to pretend I didn’t hear that, and eat my breakfast before I deal with any more crazy magic nonsense.” Although even that was proving harder than expected with those damn claws now. Holding a fork is a lot harder when you have big ol’ nails getting in the way. Is this how those fancy secretaries with the long acrylic nails feel all the time?