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Gregory Aster

Creator & Director
Experimental videographer and cosmic storyteller
Portrait of Greg Aster

Player Character Record

Greg Aster

”A workhorse with the social skills of a mop”

Durable mechanic-filmmaker and experimental worldmaker. High craft, endurance, systems thinking, and strange-art persistence. Weak social-facing stats. Strong risk of overbuilding the launch platform before launching the artifact.

Alias
Greg the Mechanic
Species
Human, probably
Class
Mechanic-Filmmaker
Background
Garage-Born Mythmaker
Level
Mechanic 23 / Filmmaker 13
Alignment
Chaotic Constructive

Vitals

HP
42/42
Defense
12
Speed
30 ft.
Init
+1

Primary Stats

STR14Brawn
DEX10Hands
CON16Endurance
INT15Systems
WIS8Limits
CHA6Charm
Craft17
Systems16
Lore14
Signal10
Self-Care5
Weirdness18

Backstory

A mechanic, filmmaker, builder, and experimental worldmaker from the Pacific Northwest garage ecosystem. After years of short films, local cable television, practical builds, strange vehicles, and handmade media experiments, Greg entered a systems-building arc: turning MEGAMEAL, DNDIY, trail writing, experimental video workflows, local signal systems, game architecture, and real-world artifact products into one interconnected creative machine.

The current campaign is not only to make stranger art, but to build the tools, portals, publishing paths, and fictional-commercial ecosystems that let the strange art keep reproducing.

Condition
Operational / overextended.
Armor
Work clothes, boots, stubbornness.
Terrain
Garage, trail, film set, abandoned infrastructure.

Saving Throws

Endurance+6
Improvisation+6
Mechanical Problems+7
Creative Obsession+5
Technical Panic+4
Bureaucracy-2
Networking-3
Adobe Products-4
Self-Maintenance-4

Skills

Repair+8
Fabrication+7
Diagnostics+7
Video Editing+6
Camera Operation+5
Visual Taste+5
Layout Design+1
3D Asset Work+5
Signal Video Pipeline+5
Worldbuilding+6
System Architecture+6
Mobile Publishing+4
Game Structure+4
Product Mythology+5
Promotion-2

Proficiencies

  • Spoken language: English
  • Mechanic’s tools and shorthand
  • Welder / fabrication tools
  • Electrical diagnostics
  • Camera equipment and menus
  • DaVinci Resolve
  • Blender half-fluency
  • Node graph lab
  • Linux terminal
  • 3D printer and shop tools
  • Cat negotiations

Feats / Special Abilities

Wrench Logic

Repair, modify, diagnose, or keep broken objects working long enough to finish the job.

Workhorse Mode

Continue difficult physical or creative work after normal morale checks fail.

Garage Artificer

Convert junk, tools, cameras, software, and unsafe ideas into props, films, sites, or devices.

Portal Architect

Restructure scattered stories, posts, products, and game ideas into navigable world systems.

Reality-to-Lore Converter

Turn tools, trail notes, products, and broken workflows into lore-bearing artifacts.

Local-First Signalwright

Favor self-hosted tools, open systems, controllable workflows, and vendor lock-in resistance.

Product Cryptobiologist

Design fictional commercial lifeforms and artifact-products that can cross into the real world.

Anti-Hype Filter

Detect stale advice, marketing fog, generic recommendations, and dodged questions.

Physical Limit Tester

Push past normal mileage or project duration, then make a Self-Maintenance check.

Personality

Traits
Turns problems into systems, systems into tools, tools into workflows, and workflows into lore.
Ideals
Make the weird thing real. Keep creative machinery under personal control. Build portals, not feeds.
Bonds
April, cats, MEGAMEAL, DNDIY, the unfinished project calling from the garage.
Flaws
Can overbuild the launch platform. Promotion feels like a cursed social minigame. May push body, tools, and patience too hard.
Complication
Scope Multiplication: a small feature request may become a platform, mythology, editor, publishing system, store structure, helper layer, and refactor plan.

Active Quests

  • Reforge MEGAMEAL into a professional world portal.
  • Build a phone-first publishing path for trail notes and Markdown posts.
  • Develop the Merkin game architecture: web-first, TV-capable, low-barrier.
  • Create the first real MEGAMEAL product: the Snuggaloid destructive mystery artifact.
  • Assemble local-first signal tooling for creative and helper workflows.
  • Convert scattered lore into maps, timelines, factions, products, and playable systems.

Completed Quests

Media

  • Produced more than 80 short films, including live action, animation, and music videos.
  • Produced a 33-episode local cable TV show.
  • YouTube channel with over 80,000 lifetime views.
  • Featured on Adult Swim and at film festivals.

Builds

  • Built art projects for large-scale events.
  • Built cars for the Gambler 500, Burning Man, and Adult Soapbox Derby.
  • Built a personal submarine.

Failed Side Quests

  • Bombed out of a Mumford & Sons music video.
  • Had a failed Canadian TV show pilot.

Known Campaign Settings

MEGAMEAL
Primary cosmic horror fast-food parody universe.
DNDIY
Legacy broadcast universe / old campaign archive.
Merkin’s Alternate Universe
Experimental web-theme reality layer.
Untitled Cosmic Horror
Unresolved mythology branch.

Inventory & Money

  • Blender for animation and asset work
  • Zeiss Flektogon 35mm f/2.4, M42 mount, with speedbooster
  • Lavalier mic
  • Zoom H4n Pro, broken
  • Mechanical toolkit
  • Several flamethrowers
Currency
96k cents
Load
Heavy shop load

Transmission Links

YouTube
youtube.com/dndiy
Doc Ref · PCR-001-GAIssued · 2024-10-15Rev · 005Clearance · Public Echo
0xAA-7C-FF-2E// END OF RECORD //VERIFY ◇ ▣ ◈
Created: 10/15/2024
Last updated: 5/8/2026
Profile Image of Gregory Aster
Gregory Aster
Experimental videographer and cosmic storyteller