Family Relations
Family relations describes the ancestral and familial ties the player character possesses in the game world, as it's reasonable to expect an individual to have parents, siblings and perhaps even children. The existence of these is established through the character background generator, which gives no consideration whatsoever to the player's wishes in this matter. We do not choose what sort of family we are born into ... so if a given character is to have some sort of background, the fact of the character's pre-determined relations must be taken into account.
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Nor can the player dictate the family's level of success, nor the family's attitude towards the character. Since the character begins the game at maturity, there are years of conflict, potential resentment, sacrifice or responsibilities that are utterly unaccounted for — and while the character can decide how he or she feels about them, they are just as free to decide for themselves how to view the character. This is also determined through the background generator, related to the character's ability stats.
Therefore, it's nearly impossible for the player to create a background such as "an orphan bent on revenging the murder of his or her parents," because much of the time both parents are still alive in the game world. Most of the time, orphans hardly know their parents, since they often become orphans when they're too young to remember much. In deciding a background, a player can "make up" a family relationship of their own — but this would be a lie, one that every other player at the game would be aware of, because secrets between players in the game leads to discord and bad game play.
Status
Every player would like a character to be born rich and possess influence. Everyone wants to be secretly a noble, with an open path to a throne. However, as there's no control over the family he or she is born into, or its status, players must accept that most people are born of farmers, miners, labourers, artisans and other everyday people.
As children, characters learn ability skills related to that progenitor's profession. This may happen even if the character is an orphan — since the player's rise to a levelled class presupposes some kind of mentor. This background also affects the character's starting wealth and credit.
Choosing Stats
Players wishing to reduce the size of their game families should choose a lower strength, since that stat reflects the character's innate qualities passed down through bloodlines]]. Character classes that put more emphasis upon spellcasting, charisma or criminal behaviour tend towards isolation or resentment against society, and so those classes are more likely to be orphans than a fighter, ranger or paladin who wishes to defend society.
Characters who want to get along better with their families should choose a higher wisdom, as this reflects the characters empathy and compassion for other persons. Characters with a low wisdom tend towards selfishness and bitterness towards others, and are thus liable to turn away their families and relations, who want nothing to do with such persons.
If the character wishes to be born into nobility should choose a higher charisma, as this is a trait that many successful leaders in a medieval framework possess. This said, however, the chance is still very low, just 3%, that even if the character's charisma is influential in his or her upbringing, that achieving noble or royal status might become fact.
