[Mercer]

For whatever reason, I find that Negative Qualities personalize a character most.  Your stats and skills and tech or magic-- even Positive Qualities tend to be fairly generic.   The Negative Qualities tell the story of who a character is. 

That said, I was thinking of going kind of dark with my new character, but I'm having a little trouble getting the Negs to line up.  The idea started something like this:

Criminal SIN (10)
Bad Rep (5)
Big Regret (5)
Lost Loved One (5)
Pacifist (5)

When I started this in my head (without access to my books) I was thinking that the Big Regret was that the character had killed his Lost Loved One, which gave him a Bad Reputation, a Criminal SIN and the Pacifist quality-- the last because now he knows what kind of shocking violence he is capable of and the harm he can cause even to those he cares about.  It doesn't quite fit because it seems like Lost Loved One is a mysterious death, and it doesn't seem like it's Big Secret if you went to prison for it, since it would be part of the the public record.

The character is now back on the street after his stint in prison, and his "fixer" is a crooked parole officer who uses him to generate revenue and to occasionally run down other parolees.  The character is going to be loaded up on Notoriety at the start of play, but he's not a runner in the conventional sense, he's either coerced into runs by his PO or works with the other PC's as part of their team.  (For this game we're doing a group background, which is not something we've ever done before.  All the runners grew up together on the same block and have known each other since they were kids, so there's a common bond there.)

I would like a Neg that represents being under the thumb of the crooked PO but haven't found anything.  In Debt is the closest; I'd take the money at chargen but instead of it being a loan it'd be the rent I had to pay my PO to stay out of prison.  Alternately, I could make my PO a Dependent in the 10 BP range.  I think the former works better-- I like having a defined target I have to meet or bad things happen.  It also makes sense because the PO is how my character got his (highly illegal) cyberware, and the PO would see that tech as an investment on future earnings.  I could squeeze 10-20bp out of it, which would be a monthly payment of 1500-3000ny.  That's pretty stiff but it makes sense for the character.  (The PO should be making enough money on this to justify being crooked.)

As for the rest I like the Bad Rep and Big Regret tied into Pacifist.  That's 15 there, and then say 10 for Criminal SIN and 10 for In Debt.  (I guess I could ditch Criminal SIN and instead of a crooked PO it would be someone else blackmailing the character.  I like the ex-con angle but I'm not married to it.)  Any thoughts?

[UmaroVI]

I actually think your In Debt idea is the way to go. Lost Loved One means you are looking for the lost loved one, not that they are known to be dead. Big Regret sorta works - it assumes it's something that others can find out, but that isn't public knowledge.

You might consider In Debt 5, and Big Regret 5. Go with something like you got officially charged with something else, so people who look up your record will see you got busted for that, not "murdered his wife" or whoever he killed. I'm sure there could be a variety of things that you could get imprisoned for that wouldn't be out of the ordinary and that could happen in the course of killing someone.

[Mercer]

I may take Lost Loved One by saying that he caught his girlfriend cheating on him; he killed the guy and nearly killed her.  She took off, he did a stint for voluntary manslaughter (because the character isn't that old, he'd have only spent about 5 years in prison, so say half of a 10 year bit).    Now he's wracked with guilt and torn between trying to find her and being too ashamed.  It's a bit darker than I'd usually go on a character, and it pushes the character out of what I'd consider the sympathetic range but it might be interesting.

I didn't think about it until just now, but this basic structure is pretty close to Boyd Crowder on "Justified".  Spoilers for the uninitiated but I think it's a good example of how a character could start off as a reprehensible person and end up somewhere else. 

Now that I think about it, he doesn't have to have killed anybody.  He could have just attacked his gf and gone to prison on an aggravated assault charge.  Maybe she shot him.  It hews pretty close to the "Justified" pilot, but I figure if I'm going to steal, I should steal as much as possible of the good stuff.  It also makes more sense with a relatively short prison sentence.

I could see taking Big Regret if it wasn't common knowledge why I went to prison, and it would be information that my PO-- or anyone else-- could use to blackmail me.  But between the two I think Bad Rep is the more apt choice.  I'm thinking the character was a low level criminal (probably a ganger) before he went to prison, doing things like jacking cars and the occasional mugging or home invasion.  If his gf shot him while he was trying to kill her, that's the kind of gossip that people would make the rounds. 

It also makes a nice tie in with the group, since my character grew up with the other runners.  They went on to other careers (military, corporate and one professional athlete) before washing out and ending up back on our block, my character would be the guy who never left (unless you count prison).  It also means that the other team members would have known the ex-gf, probably grown up with her as well.   

[JustADude]

Sounds like you've got it just about nailed down... at least there aren't any flaws I can see, and I can't think of any suggestions to add.

I also want to say it's nice to see someone putting some real thought into making their character a unique entity. Far too many cut'n'paste min/maxed types out there.

[Mercer]

Thanks for the help guys.  I ended up going with:

In Debt (10)
Criminal SIN (10)
Bad Rep (5)
Lost Loved One (5)
Pacifist (5)

The game is still probably a month off, so I have time to change everything several times.  I like Pacifist because most of my characters tend to be fairly moral and ethical so I figured I might as well get 5 points for it, but now I'm rethinking the prohibition against wetwork.  My reasoning is twofold.  From a player perspective, there may be a day where the GM hasn't had time to prep very much and he just throws us a quickly put together contract hit and I don't want to be the guy who's like, "My character can't do that, you guys have fun."  From a character perspective, I'm thinking that being an convicted felon on parole with a crooked parole officer that coerces him into running, he might not have the luxury of saying no.  The character might be a Pacifist who would never willingly take on a wetwork assignment, but if it's that or prison then he might have to think about it.  He wouldn't kill an "innocent" but if the target was the usual sort of scumbag ("If I show up at your door, chances are you did something to bring me there.") then he could probably make it work.

I'll talk it over with the GM.  If it's a non-issue I won't worry about it. If I needed another 5 pointer to replace Pacifist, I could go with 5pt Enemy (the gang leader that replaced him when he went to prison) or I could raise my In Debt by another 5k.  I don't particularly want to raise my In Debt because I spent about an hour obsessing over the last 900 nuyen and I don't want to go through that again. 

[All4BigGuns]

Thanks for the help guys.  I ended up going with:

In Debt (10)
Criminal SIN (10)
Bad Rep (5)
Lost Loved One (5)
Pacifist (5)

The game is still probably a month off, so I have time to change everything several times.  I like Pacifist because most of my characters tend to be fairly moral and ethical so I figured I might as well get 5 points for it, but now I'm rethinking the prohibition against wetwork.  My reasoning is twofold.  From a player perspective, there may be a day where the GM hasn't had time to prep very much and he just throws us a quickly put together contract hit and I don't want to be the guy who's like, "My character can't do that, you guys have fun."  From a character perspective, I'm thinking that being an convicted felon on parole with a crooked parole officer that coerces him into running, he might not have the luxury of saying no.  The character might be a Pacifist who would never willingly take on a wetwork assignment, but if it's that or prison then he might have to think about it.  He wouldn't kill an "innocent" but if the target was the usual sort of scumbag ("If I show up at your door, chances are you did something to bring me there.") then he could probably make it work.

I'll talk it over with the GM.  If it's a non-issue I won't worry about it. If I needed another 5 pointer to replace Pacifist, I could go with 5pt Enemy (the gang leader that replaced him when he went to prison) or I could raise my In Debt by another 5k.  I don't particularly want to raise my In Debt because I spent about an hour obsessing over the last 900 nuyen and I don't want to go through that again.

The 5 pt Pacifist isn't bad. Just can't kill unless you're pretty sure that it's either kill or die.

[CitizenJoe]

Just reflavor the pacifist thing to relate to the criminal SIN.  You're not going to kill anyone unless you're sure you can get away with it.  Extend that to all the violence.  Basically, you're a 'Legitimate Businessman'.