Fleshing out your sci-fi character…
This is a program I wrote loosely based on the Central Casting: Heroes of Tomorrow background generator.
UPDATE 2020: I finally went back into it and cleaned it up, wrapped it in CodeIgniter and Bootstrap. I also broke the process down into its stages so that it did not tax the server so much. After the first 3 stages where you select Genre, Species, Tech Level, it goes through each phase. These are listed below. At some point, I plan to combine some steps (like all the Birth related steps) into one, but that’s a little more complex than you think.
And to those annoyed by being required to log in, sorry. I needed to add a layer of security.
8/12/2021 – Sorry, I did not know it wasn’t working. I guess I did not fully test it out after the last change. It works now
1/8/2022 – I had to place the app behind the log in screen to limit the access to REAL people. Bot’s were using it to do bad things so I had to do something
9/10/2025 – Upgraded to CodeIgniter 4 and PHP 8+. Now that I am back into it, I am writing a fantasy version
Customization
In order to customize this program for a specific game, I would need entries for a lot of tables. Here is a list of tables I use for this program. Each table is pretty much a number and a text entry. If you want to put together all the entries for your setting, I will import to the database and create a separate app for you to use. Free of charge.
It starts with the Core Tables –
Future Genre Types – Pick a sci-fi genre for the game setting. This may be just one Entry for your setting but it is one of those starting selections.
Character Species – Pick a type of General Species Type for your character. Mine has generic but we can list them specifically for a setting.
Tech Level – Pick a general tech level for the character in the game setting. This may be one universe tech for everyone or it may be varied. You can pick and select what Tech levels I have in the list. Sub tables will include
Technoculture – Randomly generated Technological Culture of the characters home world society. Subtables might include Technoculture: Tech Level – Mixed (Reroll table), and Technoculture: Alien Technology but they are optional. Take a look at what I have and then summarize what works for your setting.
Technology and a culture’s social climate are intertwined, but never bound by a straightforward formula -there’s no universal “this culture equals that technology” rule. Add in the wild unpredictability of truly alien species in science fiction, and suddenly, any imaginable (or unimaginable) pairing of culture and technology becomes possible.
Social Status – Randomly generated Social Status of the character’s family at the time of his or her birth. This includes an optional table Social Status: Nobility.
Birth Legitimacy – Randomly generated Legitimacy of the character’s birth. This may or may not be important in some settings. Legitimacy is more important in fantasy than in Sci-Fi I think but it was included. It’s a yes or no Table and can be locked in to a Yes of need be.
Family Members – Randomly generated number of parents and/or extended family that the character grew up with. This is a very relative and human-centric. You can set this to any limit. This includes subtables like Family: One Parent (mother or father), Family: Sibling (brother or sister), and Family: Guardian (separate table to determine who was the guardian) and Family: Other Relations (random other type of families).
Siblings & Birth Order – Randomly generated number of siblings and birth order of the character
Birth Place – Home World – Randomly generated home world or home location for the character. If the character’s primary future history is Tarnished Tomorrows or Post Holocaust, this can be ignored. These futures assume that birth occurs on the characters racial home world (usually). In my version, it is 4 random generic planet types (Racial Home World, Core World, Colony or Frontier) but it also can be a planet list.
Birth Place – Home World Types – Randomly generated home world or home location type. These types include volcanic, hostile, airless, water, frozen, etc. If we have specific worlds, we can bypass this table by just leaving it blank or we can assume it defines it a specific region of the planet.
Birth Place – Place of Birth – Randomly generated birth place. Hospital or somewhere else? This can be as long or as short as you want. This includes optional tables Birth Place: Place of Birth: Vehicles, and Birth Place: Exotic Places.
Unusual Events at Birth/Unusual Births Events: Birth Events – Randomly generated events that occurred at birth. Two separate tables – How many and what the events are.
Family Details – Randomly generated occupation and traits of the character’s family members.
Noteworthy Aspects of Family members: – Each Family member gets a little something from this table.
Childhood Events & Adolescence Events – Randomly generated events that occurred in the character’s childhood and character’s adolescence. (two separate tables). These include subtables optional Special Events in Childhood and Special Events: Adolescence
Education – Randomly generated educational experience for the character.
Significant Adulthood – Events Randomly generated events that occurred in the character’s early adulthood.
Personality Traits & Personality Traits (Alignment & Attitude) – Randomly generated Personality traits gained throughout the character’s life. These are all related to the events that occur. These can be anything personality or psychological related but the table I have is pretty exhaustive. These include Lightside Traits , Neutral Traits, Darkside Traits and Exotic Traits.
Beyond this point, these are table are expansions off the core tables above – from events, items, careers and groups and NPCs. These can be total customized for each setting.
Occupation tables – These include Occupations: Occupations Selection, Occupations: Low Income Jobs, Occupations: Blue Collar & Moderate Income Jobs, Occupations: High Income Jobs, Occupations: Special Income Jobs, Occupations: Lo Tech, Special Occupations: Final Frontier, Special Occupations: Imperial Space, Special Occupations: Tarnished Tomorrow, and Special Occupations: After the Holocaust, Merchants, Government Jobs, Crafters.
If necessary, you can also roll on tables for Occupation Performance – Work Attitudes and Level of Achievement, depending on the detail you want.
Hobbies – Hobbies: Type of Hobby, Hobbies: Degree of Interest , Hobbies Hobby Proficiency. Sent here base don Events or Occupation.
Tragic Events – Tragedies and Tragic Causes,
Wonderful Events – The Opposite of Tragic Events
Otherworldly Events – Other Worlds, Reasons for Being Here and the Events
Other Event tables – Lo-Tech Events, Group Events, Tarnished Tomorrows Events, Final Frontier Events, Imperial Space Events, Post Holocaust Events, Exotic Events
Underworld Experience – How we got there, Types of Crimes, Independent criminals, Events, Pirate Events
Military Experience & Duties – Branch of Service, Rank , Special Duties, Noncombat Special Duties, Events, War Time, Skills (Space, Naval, Survival, Service, Vehicle & Combat) .
Enslavement – Duration and Events.
Imprisonment – Prison Type, Duration & Events
Religious Experiences – Religions, How it Begins, Religious Events
Romantic Experiences – Who is it and Events
Patron Events – Who is the Patron, Why are you in service to the Patron, and Events.
Death Events – Circumstances, Special Circumstances , The Inheritance, Events
Groups & NPCs – Others, Other Groups, Guardians , Aliens, Nobles, Artificial Persons, Unusual Pets, Companions, Rivals.
Items – Gifts & Legacies, Weapons, Property, Clothing, Papers , Jewlery, Techno-Wonders.
Colors
Birthmarks
Body Locations
Talents, Mutations & Modifications
Talents, Mutations & Modifications: Special Talent
Talents, Mutations & Modifications: Attribute Bonus or Penalty
Talents, Mutations & Modifications: Special Ability
Serious Wounds
Bionics: Replacement Parts
Bionics: Function
Bionics: Device Appearance
Psionics
Appearances
Crimes: Crimes and Criminal Type
Unusual Skills
Unusual Skills: Textile Skills
Unusual Skills: Theatrical Skills
Unusual Skills: Circus Skills
Unusual Skills: Artistic Skills
Unusual Skills: Musical Skills
Spacecraft: Ship Type
Spacecraft: Space Capabilities
Spacecraft: Armament
Spacecraft: Special Features
Spacecraft: Liabilities
This has been very handy! Thanks.
I did not realize other people were using it. I primarily use it for my games, convention and home games. The output is a little cryptic but if you are familiar with Central Casting, it makes sense.
I decided to clean it up a little. Hope it works better for you
Is there any way we could see the source code for this ?
We’d like to rework a version to be more compatible with Starfinder ?
We can give you credit or other compensation for having done the hard work so far.
It’s not the code you would have to rework. It’s the database entries, which is a considerable amount of work.
If you would like, you can send me the preferred content you want in a document in table form. If you are familiar with Heroes of Tomorrow, the author placed the entries in table form, and you rolled on those tables. I can place those in the database and put together a version of your preference.
All my code does is read the tables, randomly pick something that table, and then moves to the next, recursively.
hey question why does it ask/ require character name and not put it on the back ground? i am doing back stories for my characters crew
SImple answer… lazy coding. If I find time, I will try to fix that.
actually its just under the background title i missed because i was half asleep
No I just added it 🙂
you are awesome. I found a copy of the central castings book as well i as a pc have oh 18 human space pirate crew. through a power of divine aura 1 minion/follower per level very low mental and social stats. (7 atm) as well as 6 newly attached employees rescued from a disabled ship that stayed with me and 6 ‘elite employees’ for a total of 43 backgrounds to create in a various tech level setting you have no idea how much this helps.
Newly updated to CodeIgniter. This will allow me to add more functionality
Sorry, I did not know it wasn’t working. I guess I did not fully test it out after the last change. It works now
Thanks for having this — I am a Traveller GM and it is nice to have it to help work out NPCs. Beats me digging through the Central Casting Sci-Fi book.
Glad you like it
Ron, what a lovely thing to allow people to use. I have had the Central Casting books for donkey’s years, but my, this takes the pain out of rolling up backstory.