Pictures
http://www.girlgeniusonline.com/cgi-bin/gg101.cgi?date=20050420
Plots:
The Test (Test)
Crisis of Infinite Agathas (Infinite Agathas)
Wulfenbach Interests (Wulfenbach Interests)
[Clank Soldiers]? ([Clank Soldiers]?) -- [Clank Soldiers]?
The Grappling Gun (Grappling Gun) -- A fat gun, which when fired shoots a heavy metal line with a grappling hook on the other end. Useful for getting into or out of a fight, catching on overhanging projections to swing, pulling switches from a distance, and so on. Can only be used once at a time: requires two minutes to unhook and reset.
Coat of Holding (Coat Of Holding) -- Coat Of Holding
C-Gas (C-Gas) -- A small metal canister, weighing about five pounds. If activated and tossed somewhere, it will knock out everyone within a five-foot radius (or a single room, if in the Castle) for five minutes. See a GM to use.
Intimidation (Intimidation) -- You are a person with a powerful personality. As such, you have the practiced (and sometimes reflexive) ability to command others through intimidation.
To intimidate someone, show them this card and spend one Point. Rant at them with power and fury for at least one minute -- try to scare the hell out of them. You are powerful, and dangerous, and not someone to be crossed. You may then give them orders, which they must follow for at least ten minutes, until their nerves calm down a bit; until then, they are keyed up and scared.
There are limits to this ability. Other strong personalities, as well as certain others, are able to resist Intimidation; it works better on normal people and weak Sparks than it does on, eg, powerful Sparks. And you cannot order someone to do something that is counter to their own basic principles, such as (in most cases) kill someone -- if you try to do so, they may spend one Point to defy you.
You may not use this ability on any given player more than once, nor may you use it overall more than once an hour.
If you have this ability, and someone else tries to use it on you, you may counter by spending a Point and going into Intimidation mode yourself. This should result in a towering argument at top volume, but neither of you winds up scaring the other.
The following were notes while the character was evolving. They do not necessarily represent the way it came out.
The ruler of the Wulfenbach Lands -- much of what we think of at Western Europe in our world. A former ally of the Heterodyne Boys, who was treated largely as comic relief back in the day; after they disappeared, there was a great internal war, which he eventually won. He is always consolidating his power, for the good of his people -- he is clearly always afraid that, without his control, the war will break out again.
He loves his son Gil greatly, but he is a stern and authoritarian father, always testing Gil. He is well aware that Gil will need to succeed him someday, and wants to make sure he is ready. He prefers that the tests be subtle, not obviously tests until they are over. He gets quite angry at Gil when he puts himself in danger. (Proud, if it was brave and/or clever, but still angry.) He can also be casually dismissive of Gil without real intent, as seen [here] and [here]. He understands that Gil is a young man, and [encourages him to sow wild oats] when appropriate. He is quite clear that Gil must marry someone of appropriate stature, though, and note [the way he casually controls] Gil's life. He [has a fair amount of confidence in Gil], but still worries about him.
Klaus has a deliberate and measured melodramatic streak. For instance, when he is testing Gil on [this page], he deliberately makes himself look menacing, to see if Gil will back down. According to [this page], Klaus has just as foolhardy a streak as Gil does.
As illustrated on [this page], Klaus is in excellent physical condition. It is [pretty clear] that he is at least partly Construct himself, and is every bit as strong as Othar. Whatever happened to him to make him all sewn-up, he was already so before Lucrezia married Bill (v4, p32), so the implication would seem to be that it wasn't the result of the Other.
Klaus is a genius at biological sciences. The clear implication, at multiple places in the story, is that he is able to grow clones, and to reimplant saved brains in those clone bodies. (He is annoyed that Beetle's brain is destroyed when he is killed, and he regrows the body of the girl presumed to be Agatha in Book Five.) However, growing clone bodies is a long and strenuous process -- the implication is that it takes months of effort, so it isn't going to happen in-game.
He is quite ruthless, in his way, almost a bit sociopathic. He has been [experimenting on other Sparks], examining their brains to see what makes a Spark a Spark. This is the scariest aspect of Klaus, and the thing that keeps him from being a really sympathetic character. (Although he probably justifies it by saying that he only experiments on Sparks who are a danger to public order.) There is some evidence that he is slightly ashamed by this, though -- it appears that he [doesn't generally let people know] when he is, eg, experimenting on subjects. He knows about his own dark streak, and doesn't try to deny it (v4, p33).
Based on [this page], we see a bit of Klaus' pride. He has many guards available, but sometimes chooses not to travel with them, as a sign of strength. He is more or less [completely unflappable], even when potential disaster is looming. He gets angry fairly easily, but rarely scared.
He keeps the Hostage Squad in his charge. There is indirect evidence that he actually feels fairly paternal towards them. That makes a lot of sense: if the point here is to foster peace within his lands, he wants to tutor his charges to be part of that peace. So for example, he has [arranged a marriage] for Sleipnir. We get the impression that he [likes] Theo, but regards him as a troublesome son, who needs to always be taught proper respect and discipline. He also clearly feels that he needs to put a good image on for the hostages -- he [does not like] for them to see his darker side. It does seem like he has [plans for] Theo.
Klaus does not care for Othar, but there is little sign that he hates him as much as Othar hates him. He generally treats Othar as [an annoyance and a curiosity], rather than a serious threat. That said, he does clearly believe that [Othar needs to be put down] in the public interest, and even calls him "dangerous". So there is clearly some cross-plot between the two of them.
Much of Klaus' life is spent [arbitrating foolish local disputes]. One gets the impression that he makes a typically benevolent but bored King in that respect. But the same page shows that he does not suffer either fools or bureaucrats lightly. He is [quite explicit] that he doesn't enjoy dealing with his empire. He is, very clearly, bored and frustrated by the minutiae of his job. His sole passion is research, but he misses adventuring.
Klaus [is married]! We know essentially nothing of his wife, save that she is somewhere else, but it sounds like she is still alive. Possibly some foreign princess? This is an interesting potential plot hook, if I want to go down this slightly dangerous road.
Note how [disturbed Klaus is] by the news of the time windows. I get the distinct impression that he knows something about what's going on here. Dollars to donuts he's seen one or more of these in the past himself, and knows more than he's letting on. On (v4, p62), it's pretty clear that he understands that the windows are views of the future, and he is therefore very puzzled by her apparent death. This may be part of his motivation to resurrect her.
In general, the Heterodyne books [don't exactly paint Klaus in a good light] -- he is portrayed as both a fool and a coward. One gets the impression that he's spent the years since then living them down, and doesn't like to hear about them. I believe he resented the Heterodynes their easy heroism in the young days, and the times since then have demonstrated that harder measures are needed in order to keep the peace.
Klaus is [quite realistic about the need to scuttle the Castle] in case of a true crisis. Note on that page that "Captain Patel" is apparently the captain of the Castle; the extent of his authority is unclear.
There [is evidence of a certain vanity] in Klaus: everything in the Castle is deliberately aesthetic, and signed.
Klaus was originally a student of Beetle's, and still thinks of him as a friend, insofar as Klaus has any friends.
Klaus' great fear is losing control. Darker: Yes, this fits. In fact, have we actually seen him go Spark-y? Justin: blink What an interesting question. I'm honestly unsure that we have. That is interesting. This is probably strongly due to the fact that [he went away for a few years, and came back to a world in chaos]. Note the implication on this page that his own ancestral lands were devastated. Also, note that this chaos isn't really new: the implication is that the Heterodynes had beaten it back for a time. Hence his desire to prevent it from happening again, and his [ruthless use of force] to deal with problems from then on. Note also the implication that he doesn't know what happened! He wants Adam and Lilith to fill him in on the missing events.
While it is clear that [Klaus doesn't want Agatha running around loose], it is also clear (v3, p103) that he bears no malice towards her -- he is genuinely puzzled about why she has been kept hidden from him. Barry's return has something to do with it, but it's not clear what. He clearly regards it as deathly important to preserve "the peace" (v4, p36), and simply by who she is she threatens that. He is also very nervous about her relationship to Lucrezia.
That said, it's also clear that, by (v5, p105), he no longer thinks benignly of her at all. He is clearly suspicious of what could happen (perhaps quite accurately), and forbids Gil having anything to do with her. [Later on], it becomes quite explicit that he understand the Time Windows, and is worried that Agatha may become the Other, even if she isn't already. However, note that this comes after the nominal game start, so he hasn't yet said that at game time. And even with all that, he still [wants her alive].
Klaus wears a locket (v4, p35), which appears to have pictures of Lucrezia and (I suspect) Bill?. This does seem to imply that he still bears a torch for her, after all these years.
It is well-known SOP that [Klaus sends a "quester"] to look into mysterious occurrances. So everyone should be expecting one in this case; they just don't expect Gil.
This is a question we have to wrestle with. Let's face facts: he is abusively powerful. Not only is he a top-end Spark himself, he is the unchallenged master of the most powerful faction in the world. Having a King in a game is always dangerous to begin with; having one as activist as Klaus, who believes that Control is utterly essential to peace, it a potential recipe for disaster. It would not only be possible for him to deal with the game's key plots by tossing in cans of C-Gas and ordering up a hundred Clanks soldiers, it would be correctly roleplaying the character.
Darker: I agree 100% (and was thinking very much the same thing just last night, actually). Klaus is somewhat of a force of nature in the comic - much more than that, of course, but his dominion is quite literally unparalelled (so far as we know), and while many scheme against him, whatever he turns his active, personal attention towards tends to go his way.
This implies to me that Klaus cannot naively be in the game. At the absolute least, he has to be separated from his power-base. Better, though, he shouldn't be in-game as such. He might be transformed in some fashion (possibly typing into the Erratic Clank idea?), or he might just be offstage. It would probably be ideal if he was known to be missing, and his disappearance apparently relates to the situation at Amagog Castle somehow -- that would give his people a reason to be here, motivating the situation.
Darker: One straightforward notion is that while the Perfect Construct is interesting to Klaus, there are more pressing matters that demand the attention of both him and the majority of his ground forces. Another is that the expedition is a test for Gil - perhaps straightforward, perhaps not. Or perhaps he's aware that something in the castle is dangerous to constructs, changing their behavior (see Replicators), and doesn't want to risk being near the place given his own reconstruction. Or combine the first notion with some sort of covert oversight - remote-observing/controlling some being as a spy. (I don't see him as the type to do a fire-and-forget personality imprint; too risky/uncontrolled.) Regardless of personal presence, he'd certainly have agents present.
Justin: good point. I've actually been assuming that the Castle had to be out of the picture for some reason -- it's just too much of a power base to be available. And the big problem was how to get Klaus away from the Castle. But it's very easy to come up with a scenario that calls for him and the Castle to be away, fighting some Spark rebellion or some such.
Indeed, that works rather well in many regards. Klaus might well have sent Gil out to conduct the investigation here, but of course he wouldn't send him unprotected. That allows me to explain almost arbitrary other people from the Castle being along -- as support and protection for Gil.
I'll have to chew on this. I'm rather attracted to the "Klaus disappeared" plot idea, but it's hard to control, and really -- I don't want him to appear at any point in the game. So simply taking him offstage may well be the smart option...
Note that there is precedent (v4, p35) for Klaus sending Gil out on a critical mission with DuPree, especially if he can't go himself. So it would be quite reasonable for us to put something similar into the game. It also puts extra pressure on Gil to do well here: since his father isn't around to argue with, he probably feels a bit more bound by his orders.
Darker: Not to mention it ties well into the "Test for Gil" thing. Either Klaus doesn't tell Gil that this mission is a test (in which case Gil will probably assume that it is), or he does tell Gil it's a test (in which case, Gil will probably be looking for the other test he's supposed to find). Justin: heh. Yes, a fine point. We should write this into Gil's character sheet, whichever way we want to spin it.
The Dragon From Mars, while apocryphal, is very intriguing -- it suggests the idea that Klaus is a former revenant, which makes a disturbing amount of sense. Is this why he became a construct?
Just before (as in, days before) she married Bill Heterodyne, Lucrezia was Klaus' lover (v4, p32). That was while she was still a villain, apparently; by implication, he was sleeping with the bad guy's daughter.
On (v4, p34), Lucrezia tells Klaus that he will have to "go away", so as not to tempt her. Is this when he vanishes for a long time? Was he simply not around for any of Bill? and Lucrezia's marriage? According to (v5, p97) he was away for "a few years". It is clear that Lucrezia was not expecting him to ever come back.
Amount of Character Potential: Out (I think we've pretty much decided that Klaus can't be in the game without seriously unbalancing it.)