# Shifter character background



## Noodle (Jul 9, 2011)

Hey y'all!  I can't tell you how excited I am to run Zeitgeist - enough that I'm dumping a SoW campaign that our group has put 2+ years into (reaching early paragon) as soon as we finish up the current adventure (~ 2 more months/sessions).

Anyway, my players are starting to prep characters for the new campaign.  I have one wanting to play a razorclaw shifter monk, and I'm trying to help her work out a background.  Her idea is that she's a first-gen shifter, the child of a Risuri human father & a were, and her parents sent her off to Ber where she'd hopefully be more accepted growing up.

As an adult, Ash was skilled enough to be accepted into the _executores dola liberta_.  My idea was for her to be falsely accused of corruption, but the investigation was inconclusive, so she was exiled (rather than having her name cleared, or alternately, executed).  Returning to her native Risur, she was accepted into the RHC which saw a use for her obvious talents.

Ash's player decided that she'd like the above to be a cover story - that the higher-ups in the _execudores_ actually want an undercover agent in Risur for some reason.  I'd like to accommodate, but need some help coming up with a plausible mission/reason.

My initial thoughts after reading the player's & campaign guides:
[sblock]
The _executores_ are concerned about the Panoply on a couple fronts:

Is the Panoply, despite their professed goals, really a way to have a new elite (of the educated rather than the nobility)?
Does the Panoply in Risur have the same goals as the one in Ber?
Is the growing influence of Risuri within the Panoply really a backdoor for Risuri meddling in Ber affairs?

Does this list make sense?  Are the Obscurati tied in to the Execudores at all?  Should I plan to have the Obscurati try to recruit her?
[/sblock]

Thanks for any & all suggestions..


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## Colmarr (Jul 10, 2011)

Maybe the leaders in Ber fear Risur's progress, particularly since the Bruse has become so friendly with Danor.

Or maybe they want a scout in the Risuri seat of industry so that they have firsthand information of Flint's technological achievements (or even to learn the lay of the city ahead of "the minotaur's" visit in adventure 5 - which the PC probably wouldn't know about until the last minute).


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## benfromidaho (Jul 11, 2011)

[MENTION=6676731]Noodle[/MENTION] I see your suggestions in the Spoiler section as being good guesses.  I don't know anything more than you do on the subject, but they seem to flow well.  However, I'm not seeing the connection between the Executores and the other group.  Perhaps, I haven't read as thoroughly as I should have, to notice this connection, but I would see the other group as being more in line with the Panopoly than the Executores.


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## Noodle (Jul 11, 2011)

benfromidaho said:


> [MENTION=6676731]Noodle[/MENTION] I see your suggestions in the Spoiler section as being good guesses.  I don't know anything more than you do on the subject, but they seem to flow well.  However, I'm not seeing the connection between the Executores and the other group.  Perhaps, I haven't read as thoroughly as I should have, to notice this connection, but I would see the other group as being more in line with the Panopoly than the Executores.




That's kind of what I was wondering.  Maybe if I tag [MENTION=63]RangerWickett[/MENTION] he'll chime in?  [sblock]I'm wondering if the Obscurati has any connection, canonically, to either the Panoply (other than philosophy) or the Execudoras.  Perhaps they can, in time, try to recruit her as a triple agent once she becomes known to them (wheels within wheels)?[/sblock]


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## RangerWickett (Jul 11, 2011)

Noodle, 

[sblock]The Panoply are basically fond of new stuff, with the stated desire to find ways for people with differing beliefs to live in harmony. In actual practice they tend to have short attention spans: quick to abandon old things in order to study cultures, art, science, and other stuff that they haven't encountered before. 

But basically, they'd not get along with the Obscurati, despite the fact that both groups get a lot of their basic ideas from the writings of William Miller. 

The Ob have decided that their way is the best way, and we're going to force people to follow it for their own good. They view themselves are philosopher kings, and that reason, study, and hard work are the foremost ideals. But they're not fans of dissent, not anymore at least. Long ago Miller was all about discussing different ideas, but he's lived (err . . . I mean 'been around') long enough to have changed his mind.

The Panoply don't really matter as a major part of the plot until a few adventures in, but by late paragon and then epic tier, the movement and its members work against the Ob. In the meanwhile, they're just "those crazy liberals who think that everyone's viewpoints are valid, or at least can be empathized with."

Now, who's to say whether, in a few decades if left to their own devices, the Panoply might turn from a loose confederation of open-minded idealists into an institution that views itself as elite. It's a valid concern, one that a few really canny leaders in Ber might have. In fact, I rather like the idea, and if you have any suggestions on that front, we might try to weave it into the campaign.

But in the course of the campaign's timeline, the Panoply is not an 'organization.' It's a group of people pursuing thematically related and philosophically sympathetic subjects, and I planned to present them as a bit bumbling, akin to how Neal Stephenson portrays the Royal Society of London in the Baroque Cycle.

This is actually a thread of the campaign that, since it's still like a year away isn't really firmed up in my mind, so if you have any ideas, I'd love to hammer out some extra stuff to do with the Panoply.[/sblock]

But we need to keep those discussions in sblock, because it risks ruining some fun surprises in the campaign for any players who might be reading.


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