Children of Disgrace - a Redemption Chronicle
On the secret shame
(Adapted from an email to one of the players)... If you want to play an orphan and tie the reason for the orphaning to the back history, that's fine. As for the secret shame, well, any sort of thing that ends up with your father and mother and possibly but not necessarily his siblings, dead makes sense. Just no seppuku for the father, because that would wipe out the shame from the family name at least.
One thing to keep in mind on this is that I'm very cool with the group coming together on the day and working up a great big story that collects all the "shameful incidents" into some collective stain on the honour of all the families, which gives the initial characters - and their offspring/blood relative/descendant, subsequent PCs - a reason for sticking together. I can't cut you down in a duel because our fates are intertwined, or your blood relative may decide he hates me so much as to out the whole dishonour and shame everyone's family!
(Adapted from an email to one of the players)... If you want to play an orphan and tie the reason for the orphaning to the back history, that's fine. As for the secret shame, well, any sort of thing that ends up with your father and mother and possibly but not necessarily his siblings, dead makes sense. Just no seppuku for the father, because that would wipe out the shame from the family name at least.
One thing to keep in mind on this is that I'm very cool with the group coming together on the day and working up a great big story that collects all the "shameful incidents" into some collective stain on the honour of all the families, which gives the initial characters - and their offspring/blood relative/descendant, subsequent PCs - a reason for sticking together. I can't cut you down in a duel because our fates are intertwined, or your blood relative may decide he hates me so much as to out the whole dishonour and shame everyone's family!