Character Creation Guide

Due to the complexity of creating a character for play in the world of Al’Akwannon I’ve put together this step by step character creation guide. Simply follow the steps in order and you will make a playable character in the most effective and least confusing fashion

Step One Character Concept

Before you even think about looking at stats, rules, points or anything else, come up with your character concept. A character concept shouldn’t have anything to do with the meta-game aspects of the RPG (i.e. don’t think about class, level, hit points, etc.) It should have everything to do with the archetype and variants of that you want to be along with the skills and abilities you want and which really represent the image you come up with. Keep in mind game balance and power level that your DM has communicated (ask him if he hasn’t) and you will make things much easier on yourself in the long run. After all if your character concept is way too bad ass for the intended starting power level of the game, you are going to end up disappointed. Once you have a firm concept in mind, use the page titled Info on Classes and Multi Classes to help you translate your idea into the basic class configuration that fits your desire. Remember to communicate with the DM about your concept, the more info you give him the better you will be able to create something that fits with your mental imagery yet correlates with the campaign concept your DM has in mind

Step Two Race

Now that you have a solid concept you should know what general race you’d like to be. Use the page titled Incomplete Racial Templates to select your race, roll your stat pool total using the Stats and Benchmarks page and allocate those points to set your stats according to your concept. Your best stat(s) should reflect your concept’s innermost strength while other stats should compliment your overall concept. Keep in mind that stats which are too high for your concept are just as bad as stats which are too low. As a rule of thumb for game balance you should not have more than one stat which is an 18 and you should avoid going lower than an 8 on any stat without conferring with the DM. Once you’ve set your base stats (Strength, Dexterity, Constitution, Intelligence, Wisdom, Charisma, Perception and Luck) refer to your racial template for stat maximums and calculate your sub-stats

Now that you have all of your stats, proceed with distributing your 70 racial character points (CP) Skills with an asterisk next to them indicate skills that are common to most individuals of the given race. It does not mean you must pick those skills or abilities but should help you get an idea of what is common. With the exception of the Common Human race, CP can ONLY be spent for skills and abilities listed on your appropriate racial template page. Information on how these points can be spent, which abilities overlap and which do not should be noted on your racial template page. The Common Human race is allowed to spend extra CP on proficiencies listed in the General column of the main proficiency worksheet in addition to what is listed on the racial template. Proficiencies gained from your racial selections should be filled in on the front of your character sheet in the proficiencies section at the bottom. These should be the first proficiencies you pick, if any. Additionally you may end up with a single CP remaining; you may use this point to purchase a rudimentary level version of any of the proficiencies listed on your racial template

Before you move on, I highly recommend picking a name for your character. For some reason having a name attached to a concept really helps develop a sense of ownership. Take your initial concept ideas and write down the things you associate with its mannerisms and appearance. As you come up with these thoughts, fill some rough outlines in on the description and persona fields on the back of the character sheet. You can clean them up later, but they will help you though the creation process, even if they are just words here and there. To help you with selecting a world appropriate name use the page titled Incomplete Naming Conventions to come up with a name which works with the in world language system

Step Three Class(es)

You now have a solid concept and should have a general idea on the class or classes your character should be. Now you will apply that info. Remember there are advantages and disadvantages to all class combinations. Your DM will give you an experience point total which you can use to determine your starting level. If you are multi-classed, you are allowed to spread your XP as desired between classes to represent your concept. There are no set rules on how to apply experience (i.e. to emulate a “classic” D&D paladin class, one might make himself a double classed Warrior/Priest, but place 95% of his experience points into the warrior class and 5% into the priest class to emulate the combat heavy concept.)

Use the document titled Class XP and Skills to calculate your level(s) and use the Hit Points page to determine your starting hit points (HP) All characters get maximum hit points at first level but must calculate them as they go up and multiclass characters must follow a formula. The Hit Point document will explain all this. If you have a priest or wizard class association, you should calculate your base mana or theurgy pool as well

Step Four Proficiencies

The next step is to calculate how many proficiency points your character has. Use the page titled Proficiency Point Explanation to find out how to do this. In short, characters have a base of 60 PP, plus a bonus from the Knowledge sub-stat, plus 2 PP/level above 1st^ (for multi-class characters, only the higher class applies to this.) Beyond this, Rogue characters will have additional proficiency points as will Warriors, though the warrior class may only spend their additional PP on weapon and weapon related proficiencies

Once you have your base number of PP you may start spending them. There are two areas in which PP are spent, Weapon Proficiencies and Non-weapon Proficiencies. In almost all cases, I recommend picking your weapon proficiencies first, since they will be a smaller total number than non-weapon proficiencies. To do this, use the page titled Weapon Proficiency Rules to guide you through the weapon and weapon related skill selection process. You will want to use the page titled Weapon Info to help you pick actual weapons, find their weapon speeds and base damage to fill in on the front of your character sheet

After picking your weapon proficiencies you can use the page titled Proficiency Worksheet to get some free skills and spend the rest of your PP to select the rest of your skills. At the bottom of the worksheet is the list of free skills that every character gets, select those first. After you have selected all of your free skills you can start spending your points. At the top of the worksheet there is an explanation on how much it will cost you to purchase a proficiency at one of the levels (rudimentary, standard or specialized.) I recommend you print out the worksheet and use it to come up with your own unique skill package

If you use the worksheet, this is how I recommend using it. With a pencil, go through and put a little check in the box of any skill you think applies to your concept. After you do that, go through and pick your top two or three choices for skills (from that you will pick your specialization, usually one...two or three if you are a rogue.) Then go through and pick your core skills. This should be about ten to fifteen skills that you think are the crux of your concept (these will become standard skills.) The remaining skills should be rudimentary skills that round out various aspects of your character (skills picked up through the character’s life path.) Calculate how many points you have dedicated to your wish list, then begin to trim your way back to your available PP total

Other than the above general recommendation with skills, I find there are really two primary feelings about skills and skill rolls. There are people who enjoy rolling as many skills as they can and there are those who want to avoid rolling as many skills as they can. Figure out which type you are or toward which side you lean and that will help you in how you pick skills. If you like rolling skills, I recommend a far greater number of rudimentary skills and that you follow a path very close to the one I mention above (a specialization, a handful of standard skills and the rest rudimentary.) If you want your character to be accomplished at the things he does and don’t want to roll much to succeed at what you do, then I recommend a large number of standard skills. You will end up with fewer skills, but you won’t ever have to roll them in basic applications of the skill. This also makes for a less complex character if that is what you’re interested in

Once you have picked all of your skills, I recommend writing them down in related groups (i.e. all stealth skills, all lore skills, all influential skills, etc.) in the proficiencies section of your character sheet. Next open up the excel document titled Proficiency Worksheet Calc and enter your stat numbers on the stats tab. The base percentages will be calculated for you on the other tab based on the appropriate formula for the skill

Step Five Wizard Guilds and Priest Orders

If you aren’t a wizard or priest, your character is mostly done aside from the fluff of character history, descriptions, birth dates and contacts/enemies. If you are a wizard or priest, then you have a bit more to do. The DM will have to provide you with a guild or order template that fits your character concept. This will require some explanation on the part of the DM, but will generally provide you with a template similar to the race and class templates. You will gain CP especially for purchasing powers and proficiencies unique to that guild or order. Additionally you will be provided a list of spells that you automatically gain and for wizards you may have to roll for random spells to round out your repertoire. This is an interactive process, one that will have to be done with your DM