Friday, June 21, 2013

60 Mundane Fantasy Jobs

Fisherman is a valued occupation.
(Skyrim)
Most people in Fianyarr won't identify themselves by class anymore than we identify ourselves by eye color. They have jobs and careers much as anyone else though over the course of the campaign they are likely to break away from this to go off on their adventures.  In order to encourage a more fully realised history, get your players to select a prior occupation that provides a little flavour and helps encourage the players to come up with a history for their character beyond Elf Bard.  If you want to know more, you can find the list of articles over here.

Animal Handler: You might have been a farrier who cared for horses, reared doves in a dovecote, looked after ravens or messenger pigeons for a message service, bred dogs to pull sleds or looked after hawks for the nobility.  Animal Ken Specialty: Specified Animal.

Ambassador: You have a heavy responsibility as the representative for your country or organisation and must do what you can to uphold that reputation in the public eye.  Politics Specialty: Reputation.

Apothecary / Herbalist: You dispense herbal and chemical remedies out of a stall, store, caravan or from the back of your own home.  People know to come to you with any ailments.  Medicine Specialty: Herbal Medicine.

Architect: You design buildings for a living and know how to incorporate both form and function into a design. Academics Specialty: Architecture. 

Artist: You have a knack and a lot of experience with creating tapestries, heraldry, paintings, sculptures or other fine art.  Expression Specialty: One of the above.

Armorsmith: You labored as an apprentice under an armorsmith and have specialised in the creation of various forms of leather and metal armors.  Craft Specialty: Armor.

Bathhouse Attendant: You work in the local bathhouse where people pay a small fee to get clean and are responsible for providing towels, drinks and soap.  The baths might range from simple cold water affairs to lounging palaces fed by hot springs.  Socialise Specialty: Put at ease.

Barber: While you cut hair and shave beards your sharp implements are also called up to assist with surgical and dental problems.  Medicine Specialty: Surgery or Dentistry.

Blacksmith: While you could turn your hand to armor, your focus is on those practical implements that so many people take for granted such as nails, horse shoes, and other mundane yet necessary items.  Craft Specialty: Metalwork.

Bodyguard: You've spent your life protecting the lifes of rich individuals who have a lot of enemies and have found that the best method of defence is frightening off any dangerous individuals.  Intimidation Specialty: Back off.

Botanist: You are fascinated by the myriad forms of plant life out there and make it your life's work to discover new species and catalogue them.  Survival Specialty: Plant Identification.

Caravan Guard: Its a dangerous world out there and its your job to help people transport goods from one town to the other without losing those goods to highwaymen.  Streetwise Specialty: Notice dangerous traveller.

Carriage Driver: You are responsible for driving a carriage or cart that is pulled by horses or other such beasts whether it is to transport people, goods or even livestock.  Ride Specialty: Carriage.

Cartography: In a world without GPS there is a need for someone to go out there and make the maps so towns can be placed, roads built, and territories understood.  Survival Specialty: Maps.

Chaplain: You have been invested with authority by a local religious institution and are responsible for providing religious services to castle servants or men at arms.  Empathy Specialty: Military Men or Servants.

Craftsman: You held an important job making a particular item.  You might have been a candlemaker, carpenter, clothier (made clothes for the nobility), cordwainer (shoemaker), jeweller, potter (ceramic maker), glassblower, or weaver.  Crafts Specialty: Specified by trade.

Cutpurse: You're the kind of thief that specialises in picking the pockets of distracted individuals.  Larceny Specialty: Distraction.

Cook: You could have been a baker, village cook, castle cook, inn cook or military cook.  One way or another, you know your way around an oven.  Crafts Specialty: Cooking.

Diplomat: Its your role to smooth the path for your paymaster to help them accomplish your goals.  Unlike an ambassador you can do it with a bit more discretion.  Politics Specialty: Campaigning.

Entertainer: You might have been a dancer, singer, juggler, musician, acrobat, or even a jester (using satire and foolish behaviour to mock the nobility in an entertaining manner).  Expression Specialty: Choose one form of performance. 

Escort: You might work on the streets or in a brothel.  You might sleep with your clients or simply keep them company.  Its a job and it pays the bills.  Hopefully.  Socialise Specialty: Seduction.

Executioner:You have the unenviable task of seeing people off the mortal coil.  Subterfuge or Intimidation Specialty: Expressionless.

Explorer: Your role is to visit uncharted places and find out what exists beyond what has been mapped or detailed.  Empathy Specialty: Foreign cultures.

Farmer: Without people like you there would be no food to trade and without that everyone would have to be either hunting or gathering to get by.  Still you don't get as much respect as you probably should.  Survival specialty: Farming.

Fisherman: You've found a bountiful crop within the sea.  Perhaps you fish from a boat, swim with a net, spear creatures in the shallows or dive for creatures among the sand.  Survival Specialty: Aquatic Hunting.

Footpad: You're the kind of thief that specialises in mugging people in alleyways or extorting businesses.  Intimidation Specialty: Stare, Growl or Fist thump.

Gambler:You make your money at cards or dice, likely through dodgier methods of such and often find it easiest to be underestimated as a bumbling fool.  Subterfuge Specialty: Incompetence.

Gardener: You have a responsibility to tend the gardens of your village or castle and have had to learn how to manage a variety of plants rather than producing a mass of the same plant.  Survival Specialty: Grow Rare Plants. 

Gatekeeper: You guard the gates to your home village to prevent smugglers, murderers and other creatures from entering your village without your knowledge.  Its an important job, if not a glorious one.  Larceny Specialty: Identify Smuggler.

Government Official: You are one of those many officials necessary for coordinating a large group of people.  You might work in the treasury, mayor's office, taxation department, or be a simple bureaucrat working for a nobleman.  Politics Specialty: Government Procedures.

Graveyard Keeper: You have a rather sombre role tending graves, building coffins, running the crematorium and otherwise showing respect for the dead.  Occult Specialty: Funeral Rites.

Highwayman: As you tend to rob from the rich - merchants and nobility providing the most reward - you often gain a more sterling and debonair reputation, which may or may not be entirely deserved.  Intimidation Specialty: Stand and Deliver!

Historian: You are excited by the past and have learned many techniques to find out more from ruins, local people, and texts to find out the history of a place or a people.  Academics Specialty: History (specify location).

Herald: Your role was to ensure that people knew important information.  This might be done by going to a known public place to shout out information to the masses or it could be as simple as standing by the door to a noble's ball and announcing the entrances.  Persuasion Specialty: Important Announcement.

Innkeeper: You might run an inn (place to stay), tavern (place to drink), brothel (place to ahem), or restaurant (place to eat).  Or perhaps you don't run it but you're on the counter often enough that most people treat you like you do.  Empathy Specialty: Good listener.

Labourer: You could have been a ditcher (dig castle moats and foundations), carter (transport goods on carts), porter (assisting the rich with their luggage), gongfarmer (emptying latrines and lavatories), laundress, dockworker or other heavy laborer.  One way or another, no one really notices you much and you keep your head down to blend in among the working class.  Subterfuge Specialty: Unimportant.

Lawman: Most places within Fianyarr are created with an empowered mayor and a sheriff's department that was assisted by the local militia (volunteers in times of strife) and watchmen (urban guards hired to patrol the streets at night).  Streetwise Specialty: Known Criminals.

Librarian: You have an important task in seeking out books on subjects nominated by your clients, customers or patron.  Academics Specialty: Book Research.

Magician: You entertain crowds of people with fancy movements that seem like magic and yet aren't magical at all - a fact that impresses people far more than mere magic would do.  Sleight of Hand Specialty: Magic Tricks.

Maid / Manservant: You may have been responsible for keeping the place clean, may have been a ewerer (fetched heated water), a valet (close servant to your employer), housemaid, kitchenmaid, butler or general manservant.  Socialise Specialty: Appease Rich People.

Matchmaker: You are known for your skill in putting together romantic relationships that work well together and suit the parents as well.  Empathy Specialty: Good Match.

Messenger: You have the vital role of carrying information to individuals or locations whether as part of a postal service or in a private letter.  Streetwise or Survival Specialty: Urban or Rural Routes.

Merchant: You sell things by trade, whether from the back of your cart, from a stall, store, or even from a chain of stores (though the latter is less common).  Persuasion Specialty: Haggle.

Midwife: You specialise in assisting pregnant women, women in childbirth, and babies survive those fragile times.  Medicine Specialty: Midwifery.

Military Officer: You might have been knighted for some daring deed, been an officer in the army or the navy, or perhaps hold an important position in the local guard and this has given you a better understanding of how the world works.  Tactics Specialty: Massed Forces.

Miner: You have spent enough time belowground in mortal-made tunnels to know the various perils that lie within.  Survival Specialty: Mines.

Moneylender: You worked in a bank or otherwise dealt with accounts and have a really good sense of money flow.  Academics Specialty: Accounting.

Nanny:You were hired to look after the children while their parents did whatever they needed to do.  You can take the specialty Children in Empathy, Intimidate, Persuasion or Socialise.

Natural Scientist: You wish to catalogue the various types of creatures you come across, whether insect, animal or mammal.  You might be paid to do this by a noble philanthropist but are more likely to be self-funded.  Survival Specialty: Identify Animal.

Nobleman: You were born to a life of luxury, albeit one with a lot of rules and responsibility attached.  You've never had privacy growing up and thus have learned to always keep your game face on while trying to understand other people's intentions.  Politics Specialty: Etiquette or Expression Specialty: Politeness.

Physician: You assist the sick whether by taking care of their basic needs in a charitable one-room institution, advising the government on plagues and quarantines, or assisting a noble family with their maladies.  Medicine Specialty: Disease, Poison or Degenerative Illness.

Prison Guard: Due to the nature of Fianyarr, death sentences are rare compared to prison sentences so you would likely have a number of people to deal with while keeping them working to pay for their keep.  Intimidation Specialty: Back In Line!

Rancher:  You have spent your days working a ranch where you've needed to ride here and there to ensure that the herds are alive and well.  Specialty: Type of Herd Animal

Religious Figure: You're are an authority in your local religion and are therefore responsible for shepherding a community toward the ideals and principles of that religion.  Expression Specialty: Sermon.

Sailor: You may work on a merchant vessel or a naval vessel and have learned your way to deal with the rigging, the rudder, and the other such details.  Drive Specialty: Ship or Boat.

Storekeeper: You sell other people's produce.  You might be a greengrocer, fishmonger, general store clerk, or something else but it all boils down to selling to customers.  Persuasion Specialty: This Is A Good Deal.

Snake Oil Salesman: You travel around Fianyarr selling items to guileless individuals desperate for a cure for what ails them.  You figure that you're selling hope so what's the problem if the hope doesn't pan out?  Subterfuge: Sure It Works.

Soldier:  You might have been in the army, the navy, or a mercenary force and have have been trained for war with a focus of moving in groups.  Tactics Specialty: Squad-based or Ship-based.

Teacher: Your role is to educate other people whether as a governess teaching children, a religious instructor, or a teacher at a school or a university.  Expression Specialty: Explain Facts.

Weaponsmith: You might have been an Atilliator (crossbow maker), Bowyer (bow maker), or a swordsmith but one way or another you made weapons designed to kill.  Weaponry Specialty: Type of Weapon.

So can you guys think of any more mundane fantasy jobs that should be included - whether as a suggestion under a current category like weaponsmith or under a whole new category?

1 comment:

  1. Oh, I'm loving this! I don't have any more suggestions just now but I'll have a think (I think Snake Oil Salesman and Bathhouse Attendant are my faves).

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