In my last post, I talked a little about my tabletop gaming history, and my new obsession with Fantasy Flight Games’ Star Wars: Age of Rebellion. I ended it, talking a little about the first character I created for the game, a slicer (hacker) from Corellia, Fiona Ralle. In this post, I thought I’d share some of my inspiration for creating her; maybe it’ll help someone else out on their quest to create their own tabletop RPG character.
As I had mentioned, our crew is made up of a bunch of misfits and outcasts. We have a former Imperial soldier, a pilot from Alderaan (currently trying to find himself again after its destruction), a droid left to become scrap, a thief who is not on anyone’s side but his own, a spy with only one real tie to the universe, and an engineer who enjoys sabotage. And myself, a sometimes-awkward (but brilliant) slicer on a quest to find out what happened to her family.
Fiona Ralle: Hacker on a Quest
My first childhood crush was Han Solo, one of the many reasons why I made Fiona from Corellia. Her parents both held prestigious positions; her mother was Chief of Staff to a Corellian Senator, and her father was a CorSec (Corellian Security Force) Tactical Responder. Having these occupations for them meant that Fiona could travel, and she did often with her father to visit her mother when the Senate was in session.
It was during those trips that she started tinkering with computers and droids on the ship to pass the time, from reprogramming a simple cleaning droid to the family protocol droid when she was seven. That’s when she earned her nickname of Sticks, given to her by her father who had caught her controlling the droid with a remote control in the closet.
Because I wanted to introduce some mystery, and of course, conflict in her life, her mother was killed in an assassination attempt on the Senator she worked for, an outspoken opponent of Emperor Palpatine and the Empire, and six months after that, her father disappeared under ominous circumstances. (I know, it’s not the most original story in the world, but I figure how I would play her would give it some flavor.)
She ended up in a Corellian orphanage until she was sixteen, engineered a jailbreak, and stowed away on a ship to Coruscant where she hooked up with The Vortex. The Vortex was a slicer group that was first introduced in Star Wars: The Old Republic and technically, they were shut down, but in Disney-style, I decided I wanted to keep them around (mainly for the name).
Eventually, she had a falling out with the leadership of The Vortex, but by then, the Rebel Alliance had caught her eye and, having no where else to go, joined up with them. Her technical knowledge was utilized at several secret Rebel bases, until she found a semi-permanent home at Pasture; another secret base untilized as a spot for undercover Alliance members to lay low or gather more resources. It was the perfect place to conduct research on the names and places that would keep appearing in the search for her father, and it’s also where she met Intelligence Operative Derick Ralt. (He started the game as an NPC, but when my husband was finally able to join the campaign, he took over playing him.)
They had similar origins stories, both Corellian, both with much loss in their lives. He was always looking for the opportunity to take his skills out in the field, which he did on various occaisions in the Mid Rim. Fiona would help him sort through the data he’d come back with, and he’d help her get some field experience. After spending years not really forming relationships, she realized she had strong feelings for Derick and the feeling was mutual.
Eventually, Fiona would travel with the team, providing logistical and computer support from orbit as Derick and company would meet with local operatives or gather intelligence. Fiona got her first taste of true field work on one of those expeditions; a run to Naboo that nearly ended in heartache as the team was ambushed and Derick gravely wounded.
Not long after, the Rebel Alliance came calling for Fiona and her technical skills, offering her a position with a newly formed strike team. She initially said no, wanting to stay at Pasture to continue her investigation into the incidents around both her parents and to help Derick with his recovery, it was Derick that convinced her to go. The constant travel would open her up to infinite sources of information, and she’d also be better utilizing her skills to help end the Empire.
(My GM for the game handed out extra XP if we wrote backstories for our characters, so I did mine in the style of Wookiepedia. If you’re interested in seeing it, I uploaded the PDF.)
Inspiration
Fiona’s inspiration came from a few characters on television, the first being Claudia Donovan from Warehouse 13. Claudia was a cool techo-wiz, who’d never met a computer she couldn’t hack. Or take apart. The best part? She wasn’t afraid to own those details of herself, either. She was determined, curious, quirky and a bit impulsive, and was always fun to watch.
There’s a moment where she describes herself as a trainwreck, and I feel like with Fiona’s backstory, she’s definitely had moments in her life like that as well, where she’s felt out of place and lost with all the chaos going on in the galaxy.
The second character where I drew inspiration from for Fiona was Octavia Blake from The 100 (the show; haven’t read the books yet). To preface, I’ve only seen the first four seasons of the show. Octavia started the show with no one taking her seriously; she was just the “girl under the floor.” She’s been confined all her life, and being sent down to Earth meant she was finally free, a feeling echoed by Fiona when she joined the Alliance. Octavia became fierce, brave, and confident, much like Fiona did after working with Derick at Pasture.
They also have a bit of a violent streak; Octavia after training with the Grounders, and Fiona when confronted with the ghosts of her past. Most recently, when the team infiltrated a facility where orphans were being used as slave labor in a mine in order to escape with a Force-sensitive orphan. The girl had obviously been mistreated (she was unconscious and in a hoverchair), and Fiona wanted nothing more than to murder the Imperial sympathizer in charge.
Music
I’ve made a playlist for every Dungeons and Dragon character I’ve played as since seeing the Critical Role cast do the same for their characters.