1  # Characters
  2  
  3  The human facts of your life–who you were before–matter less as each night passes. Instead, the circumstances of your vampirism take precedence. Who made you? Where do your allegiances lie? What are you bargaining with and for? You will come to be defined more by the tangled web of relationships you weave yourself into than any individual history.
  4  
  5  To create a character, first roll or choose the clan of your maker. You may not know who they are and you certainly know very little–if not nothing–about their clan. Yet they will know of you, for good or bad.
  6  
  7  Next, roll for or choose a prompt to create an entanglement between you, another player and a NPC. You were on the edge of the night this whole time. (The [NPC] and [PC] labels are suggestions; feel free to flip them to customize as you like.)
  8  
  9  Next, assign your resonances, set your conditions, hunger and blood and finally select some resources.
 10  
 11  ## Your Maker’s Clan
 12  
 13  - **2** The Clan of Death ^^
 14  - **3** The Clan of Judgement
 15  - **4** The Clan of the Beast ^
 16  - **5** The Clan of the Moon
 17  - **6** The Hidden Clan
 18  - **7** The Learned Clan
 19  - **8** The Clan of Kings
 20  - **9** The Clan of the Rose
 21  - **10** The Clan of Lies
 22  - **11** The Clan of the Night ^^
 23  - **12** The Broken Clan
 24  
 25  ^ Vampires whose makers are from the Clan of the Beast can choose a starting [resonance move](resonance_moves.md) from the **animal** resonance.
 26  
 27  ^^ Vampires whose makers are from the Clan of the Death or the Clan of the Night can choose a starting [resonance move](resonance_moves.md) from the **empty** resonance.
 28  
 29  ## Entanglements
 30  
 31  - **1** [NPC] got me into those underground parties, but was always flirting with [PC] at them.
 32  - **2** I had a side deal at the lab selling blood to [NPC] until [PC], my coworker, caught me.
 33  - **3** Me and [PC] regularly got caught by the police, but [NPC] always got us out. We owe them.
 34  - **4** I used to date [PC]’s sibling, but they left me for [NPC] without any warning.
 35  - **5** I lied about my involvement with [NPC] to [PC]. I’m worried about what they would think.
 36  - **6** [NPC] screwed over me and [PC]. Despite how we feel about each other, we’ll get our revenge.
 37  
 38  ## Resonances
 39  
 40  Each character has the same resonances, similar to stats in other games. The four are:
 41  
 42  - Choleric (ambitious, decisive, aggressive or short-tempered),
 43  - Melancholic,
 44  - Phlegmatic (reserved) and
 45  - Sanguine (enthusiastic, active or social).
 46  
 47  Assign these modifiers however you’d like to each of your resonances: +1, ±0, ±0, -1. Then, add +1 to any resonance.
 48  
 49  After you have assigned your modifiers, select or roll for a resonance move from the resonance that has your highest modifier. If two or more resonances are tied for highest, you may choose which resonance that you select a move from.
 50  
 51  ## Conditions
 52  
 53  Conditions replace a health system or harm in Duskborn. They can look like harm, but Conditions can also represent emotional or psychological states. 
 54  
 55  Every vampire has a permanent condition: “burned by sunlight.” This Condition can never be removed, but there may be ways to temporarily suspend it.
 56  
 57  ## Hunger and Blood
 58  
 59  Every vampire has two competing resources: hunger and blood. Hunger starts at 0 and Blood starts at 4, but it can be increased by the feast move (once) or through advancement. As vampires ***rouse*** their blood, hunger increases; if they ever reach 5 hunger, they must frenzy.
 60  
 61  ## Resources
 62  
 63  Your character’s resources are the interesting and distinctive items that can be found in your home or on their person. You’ll be able to mark off items from your resources to roll with advantage. You don't lose the resource, but marking it off indicates that it has been used; usually, you can't reuse a resource unless you’ve replenished it somehow in the story.
 64  
 65  Afer you have finished your biography, set your resonances and chosen your resonance move, roll or choose 3-5 resources from the table to determine what you start with. You may also make up your own resources. More resources can be accumulated through gameplay.
 66  
 67  * **11** Liudolf: Establishment information broker.
 68  * **12** Blood-drawn wards in your apartment.
 69  * **13** Pack of clove cigarettes.
 70  * **14** Keys to an 125cc motorcycle.
 71  * **15** Copy of Rumi’s *Masnavi* in the original Persian.
 72  * **16** Capsule wardrobe of all black clothing.
 73  * **21** Subway/bus pass, good for another year.
 74  * **22** Blood bag, fresh.
 75  * **23** Personal cell phone.
 76  * **24** Handful of reward punch cards.
 77  * **25** Your father’s umbrella.
 78  * **26** Expired, university ID card.
 79  * **31** Earphones that you’ve dropped too many times.
 80  * **32** Pair of steel-toed, Chelsea boots.
 81  * **33** Issue three of the zine anarchUS.
 82  * **34** SPF 100 sunscreen, almost empty.
 83  * **35** Handful of grave dirt (not yours) in a Ziploc bag.
 84  * **36** Leather jacket, perfect fit and well worn.
 85  * **41** Your dealer (they’re worried about you).
 86  * **42** Unlicensed pistol.
 87  * **43** Running shoes, good insoles and traction.
 88  * **44** Grigor: Reformist, manages safehouses.
 89  * **45** Unopened bottle of water.
 90  * **46** Old violin, losing its color.
 91  * **51** Skateboard, shredded deck and good wheels.
 92  * **52** Tailored suit, gray check.
 93  * **53** Trusted login to a private network.
 94  * **54** Tyndale Bible, DIY printed and bound.
 95  * **55** Tablet and stylus.
 96  * **56** Gossip about the local, Establishment landlord.
 97  * **61** Your maker’s phone number.
 98  * **62** Pocket, subway map.
 99  * **63** VIP membership to an exclusive club.
100  * **64** Ashley: your roommate, human.
101  * **65** Cotton face mask, comfortable.
102  * **66** Copy of *Dracula* by Bram Stoker.
103  
104  # Character Growth
105  
106  Advancement in Duskborn is measure by nights survived or ns. You earn 1ns each session. You can expend your nights survived in these ways:
107  
108  - For 7ns, you can swap any of your resonance modifiers or upgrade a resonance move. 
109  - For 14ns, you can uncross a resource or purchase a new resonance move.
110  - For 365ns, you can increase your blood by 1.
111  
112  Growth is both prescriptive and descriptive. That is, you can gather the ns, spend it and advance the mechanical bits of your character. This gets reflected in the narrative you and your group create by showing the growing capabilities of your character.
113  
114  It is also descriptive because the narrative you construct may meaningfully change your character before you can gather and spend the advancement currency. For example, your group might decide that you all want to jump forward in time; your character will have then naturally survived many nights, so selecting some upgrades, new moves or even increasing your character’s blood makes sense in order to stay true to the fiction established.
115  
116  ## Upgrading Resonance Moves
117  
118  The base of each move is listed under the resonance heading and then each of the upgrades for each move follows. The upgrades can be taken in any order unless an upgrade is indented below another upgrade. In that case, you must purchase the upgrade immediately above it before you can purchase the indented upgrade.