Choir of Flesh, Useful Tables 2

 

By the incredible Penny Melgarejo 

History is a wonderful sandbox to play in and examine for games.  In Choir of Flesh, the Twin Apocalypses affect everyone worldwide in the Year of Our Lord 1000.  On page 24 there is a d10 table to determine your Unbroken’s former occupation before the supernatural incursion occurred. This former occupation table includes a description of your previous profession, list of skills available, and series of troubles that the character could be afflicted with.  

I wanted to expand this table with 20 entries from cultures surrounding the Mediterranean that could all feasibly have arrived in France in the year 1001 AD.  I have only included a description of these character’s backgrounds; their skills and troubles are left as an exercise for the player of Choir of Flesh to determine.  

In addition, these 20 character backgrounds could also describe interesting NPCs an Unbroken could find as a Notable Citizen as described on page 37 in the core book.  Some work to determine each character’s Settlement Benefit and Potential Problem is required however.  I heavily relied on the magazine Strategy and Tactics Quarterly Issue 33 Armies of the Dark Ages for historical inspiration for these character backgrounds; and I read a scattering of internet sources including Wikipedia when further development was required. 

1d20 Table for Character Backgrounds

1) Norman Holy Land Pilgrim turned Mercenary – In 999 AD, Norman pilgrims returning from the Holy Land stayed in Salerno, Italy and were attacked by and then repulsed Muslim raiders. You are one of the survivors of that encounter, and came to France to sell their sword to the highest bidder. Your faith is forefront in your mind.

2) Lombard Revolutionary Firebrand – The Lombard Revolt against the Byzantine governor in Italy took place from 1009 to 1018. In 1000 you are a fierce patriot of your people and have come to France to rally support and find resources and men for the coming conflict.

3) Administrator of the Emirate of Sicily – The Emirate of Sicily (831–1091) was an Islamic state based in Palermo (Sicily). A hardworking Muslim member of the state overseeing the jizya tax system and other bureaucratic endeavors, you were forced to land in France in 1000 due to a naval travel accident.

4) Vatican Assassin – Secretly sanctioned by a Cardinal, you are the epitome of a religious zealot; a killer who has been forgiven a priori for the deeds you must undertake to protect Mother Church. This idea is just straight fiction from the movies Elizabeth (1998) and Brotherhood of the Wolf (2001).

5) Danish Raider – A raider of Anglo-Saxon England prior to the turn of the century (1000 AD), you’ve seen war and taken from it while on your longship. You’ve stopped to lick your wounds and count your plunder in France.

6) Norse Ulfheonar – A berserker assault warrior who draws strength from the wolf skin he wears, you harbor no religious fear for the Songs of the Choir, nor the creeping mutation of the Flesh. No, these are the end time prophesized by your people, and you are here for them. By Odin and the Wolves, it is better to die in battle and go to Valhalla than to live sniveling in the dirt behind wooden walls!

The battle of Wadi al-Khazandar, 1299. depicting Mongol archers and Mamluk cavalry; 14th-century illustration from a manuscript of the History of the Tatars. Unknown Author

7) Berber Fighter – Across the strait of Gibraltar, you were raised as a proud Berber tribesman, comfortable in the saddle as well as on foot in harsh desert environments.  Seeking a better opportunity for your clan and family you joined the Fatimid Caliphate as a soldier, one of many in the core of their army. Hearing monstrous and unholy tales about post-apocalyptic France, you were part of a regiment to push back the horrors, until your unit was shattered by supernatural forces.  Now you are alone, and will carve your way to survival through the skill of your spear-arm.

8) Christian Mercenary of the Fatimid Caliphate – Hailing from the Levant, you stand with one foot firmly in two worlds.  Of a mixed heritage, you were raised devoutly Christian and have seen those places of pilgrimage.  Puissant at arms, you have sold your sword to the Fatimid Caliphate, and they have paid you well.  On a mission to the Iberian Peninsula, you have found yourself in France in the midst of the apocalypses, much to your regret.

9) Mamluk Logistics Officer – Literate and intelligent, you occupied an honored position in the Fatimid Caliphate yet still had the status of a slave.  When the armies marched, you joined them, serving in the background as a quartermaster of supplies and weapons. What the Franks were up to that spawned Twin Apocalypses, you will never understand. But what you do know is how to survive, and make a settlement thrive, even under deprived conditions.

10) Egyptian Coptic Christian Accountant – A Coptic Christian, born as an Egyptian into the Fatimid Caliphate, you have worked hand and glove with the Muslim government to see that your merchant patron’s taxes are paid appropriately and on time.  Travel to the strange land of the Franks for trading opportunities landed you alone and adrift into the existential madness that is the Twin Apocalypses of the Choir and the Flesh.

11) Byzantine Veteran Under Emperor Basil II – You were lucky some say. Other say you are blessed; as you have survived and fought in the civil wars of Byzantium, in the war against Bulgaria and as a campaigner against the Fatimids.  Blood, mud, and the screams of the dying are your food and drink as you have cut a merciless swath through men and horses alike. Now however, you question your lack of faith in man and gods as a crack razed the sky, and the Song of the Choir radiated from the East. You are here now, in France, seeking the source of the madness, or perhaps resolution and redemption for your own dead soul.

12) Anglo-Saxon Silver Miner and Thief – Silver. It goes to the Danegeld to entice the Vikings to leave England.  But they always want more.  Angered that your back-breaking sweat in the mines only goes to enrich someone else, you organized a theft and escaped with some of your fellows from England and made it to the coast of France with silver ingots.  Then the Twin Apocalypses hit, scattering everyone. Was that a sign from the divine about your crimes? That question squirms in your gut late at night when you cannot find a cleric or mug of ale to assuage your guilt. 

13) French Low-Born Maniac – Once the low-born soldier of one of the grasping French castellans (lord of a castle) in the south of France, you prosecuted violence against church property, clerics and the poor at the behest of your lord. And you loved it.  The Council of Charroux in 989 and the Pax Dei (Peace of God) movement was established in reaction to your vicious predations but you laughed, certain that the Apocalypse would come at the turn of millennia and wipe all morality clean and establish a new social order.  Yours.  To an extent, you were right. 

14) Apocalyptic Tongued Cleric – Struck down, robbed and left for dead while traveling unarmed by a local constabulary; your life changed to one preaching fire and brimstone and revenge for social plights.  Now an eager amateur at wielding any piece of metal you can get your hands on, you preached about the overthrow of the nobles, the castellans and the social order in a wave of divine vengeance to anyone who would hear.  Much to your surprise, you were right. But you have the grit and the vision to make this new world a better one. 

15) Procurer of Ancient Manuscripts – One part ruins explorer, one part linguist, and one part thief; you filled the desire of the court of Theophanu Skleraina in the emerging German Empire for tomes in Latin and Greek on engineering, law and medicine.  It paid well, exercised your many talents, and took you across Italy and France in exciting adventures for moldering old folios and transcriptions.  Then the Twin Apocalypses hit and you wonder if some of the more curious manuscripts you have trafficked hold the key to survival for you and the people you have thrown in your lot with. 

16) Scottish Border Raider of England – Purely for profit or to solidify royal Scottish power, you are a Celtic raider with much blood-soaked experience in the English Northumbria and Galloway lands.  Used to planning ambushes, rallying peasant men to fight in your warband, absconding with useful livestock, and immolating recalcitrant villages; you are none the less a devout man, seeing no contradiction between your actions and your faith. That is why when you received instruction from the Scottish Church to make a journey far south to France to investigate a holy vision, you obeyed without hesitation.  You arrived on the mainland of Europe just in time for the Twin Apocalypses to erupt. 

17) Grasping Burgundian Noble– Duke Henry I of Burgandy is weak and dying and you will reap the spoils of your ambition. Distantly related to the Carolingian Dynasty, you are filled with pride over your heritage and honed your sword arm fighting off enemies as diverse as the Duke of Francia and Saracen raiders.  Your plans for placing the ducal coronet upon your brow have been turned to ash with the coming of the Choir and the Flesh; but it is a bright shining ambition you cling to with a death-grip. You must. 

Varangian Runestone U 153. Picture by I, Berig, CC BY 2.5 

18) Varangian Guard- A member of the Byzantine military elite, you are a Rus mercenary who fights for the Basileus (Emperor) with a mighty Scandinavian two-handed battle axe and sword as a sidearm. Campaigning against pirates from the Aegean to the Tyrrhenian Sea, you excelled at naval warfare until an unlucky engagement landed you a slave of your opponents.  Your recent conversion as an Orthodox Christian kept your spirits up as you suffered in the galley of a ship.  That was until the shipwreck that left you off the southern coast of France in a new world twisted by the Choir and the Flesh. 

19) Magyar Merchant and Nomad- A middle aged man now, you spent your youth as a nomadic horse archer and sometimes hit and run raider.  Capitalizing on the goods you captured by your military endeavors, you turned to safer mercantile activities as you grew wiser; interacting with Jewish, Italian and Byzantine traders to exchange silks and wool. Indifferent to religion, you viewed your fellow Magyars adopting Christianity in the Kingdom of Hungary with some concern. Concern that appears to be validated as the sky ruptured at the new millennium, heralding the advent of the Choir and the Flesh. 

20) Arabic Mathematician and Numerologist- A fierce zealot of the adoption of the Hindu-Arabic positional numeral system (numbers 0-9), you fled the Levant due to your obstinate nature and borderline heretical ideas. Finding a place in the Frankish court of Theophanu and Otto II, you taught decimals, mathematics and astrology.  You began seeing strange signs in the numbers of the conjunction of the spheres prior to the millennium, and following your intuition, you quietly packed your bags and traveled to France, where the Twin Apocalypses awaited you with welcoming arms. 

Additional Thoughts

Alex T, author of Choir of Flesh, has a created a playlist of music inspirational for the game.