Importing Characters

Sometimes players will wish to bring in characters from other campaigns or even from other gaming systems. The GM should be wary of the stats of such imported characters, as other GM's may have allowed the character to become too powerful to be useful in the World of Gaianar game system. For example, a character whose stats are all at racial maximum or higher should never be allowed into the game. Similarly, the GM should rule that certain devices will not function; a sword that inflicts 9d12 damage or a shotgun that blows up whole city blocks should never be allowed to function. An imported character should never be more than two levels higher or lower than the average level of the rest of the party. Thus a 10th level Warrior should not be permitted to join an adventuring group whose average level is four. Similarly, a first level Priest should also be barred from the 4th level group, as the level difference is too great.

A GM should also be wary of races not native to the Gaianar gaming system. The standard player character races are: Human, Elf, Dwarf, Changeling, and Fey. The two optional races include Construct and Werite. If the GM allows a character of an alien race, there are some helpful guidelines that should be obeyed. First, a GM should not allow player characters that are completely non-humanoid. For example, dragons, ghosts, giant lizards or man-sized insects should not be allowed as player characters. Giants, while humanoid, should also not be allowed, as they would fit very poorly into the World of Gaianar (after all, where's a 40' tall Cavalier going to get a horse? Or what church could a 35' Priest fit into?) Finally, if a humanoid alien race is allowed, the player should be warned that his or her character may be subject to fear and superstition from the more ordinary residents of Gaianar. Even the Fey and Changelings have trouble from the local folk from time to time. If an allowable alien race has a significant quantity of race-related special abilities, the GM is permitted to impose an experience penalty (like the Constructs have).

If an alien character is imported into Gaianar, then one of his or her languages automatically converts into a Gaianarian language. The GM must also determine what will become of an alien character's character class. For instance, it would be difficult (but not imposible) to import a character from a futuristic gaming system whose character classes involved space ships, fighters, and virtual reality combat. A character from an Old West setting, on the other hand, might easily translate into the game as a Gunslinger. The GM should use both wisdom and common sense in reassigning a character class to an alien player character. Also, some gaming systems use attributes that the World of Gaianar does not employ, as well as the converse. Again, the GM should take this into consideration when importing characters from other gaming systems. The table below may be of some assistance in importing characters into Gaianar.