Character Creation - SYR - Simplify Your Rules

Character creation in this system is meant to be simple and fast, but still give you the flexibility to create the exact character you have in your mind. Unlike many systems, there are no levels, classes, or restrictions on who can use what skills or magic. Individual Setting Packs may add specific restrictions or add additional attributes to ensure characters match the flavor of the setting they are portraying, but the base rules system strives to keep it clean.

Much of the fun of role playing a character is creating an interesting personality and drive for them. Some of this can be dictated by the skills and attributes of the character, but much of it grows from playing the character and interacting with the other denizens of your campaign world. Do not be surprised if your character sheet is not multiple pages of information detailing all aspects of your character. Some people have a detailed idea of what they want their character to be like and they create amazing backstories before the first game session, others have a vague idea of what kind of character they want to play and are open to having the personality grow organically as they play. Both methods are perfectly valid and are easy enough to accomplish in this system. If you do not have a lot of detail yet, go through the character creation process, buy them some gear, and get ready to play. If you need to add a couple pages to your character sheet with your backstory and lists of people you already know in the world, go for it.

With all that in mind, here are the recommended steps to create your character.

Character Idea
1. Start with at least a broad idea of what kind of character you wish to play. Reading the Setting Pack for your campaign beforehand will give you a ton of ideas on the species, skills, equipment, and history of the world.
2. Once you have the idea, you will have the direction you need to tackle the next steps, be it making a wise, old wizard, gung-ho space marine, or an insect warrior out to save their hive.
  1. Larry is a new player in a high fantasy campaign and decides he wants to play a classic, burly fighter.
Species
1. Based on your Setting Pack, there may be several species other than Human that you can take for your character. For example, a high fantasy setting might have options for humans, dwarves, elves, halflings, and gnomes, while a sci-fi setting might have humans, greys, and the lizard folk of Antares IV.
2. Choosing your species will likely provide you with a couple ranks in skills that species is adept at naturally. These skill ranks are in addition to the skill points you will assign in the next step.
  1. Larry goes with Human for his species and in the Setting Pack it notes that all Humans start with 1 skill rank in Feats of Agility and 1 skill rank in Persuasion.
Skills
1. Skills are the main driver of all your actions in the game and determining what you are good at and what actions you should avoid will go a long way to defining your character and their place in the world.
2. Each character starts out with a number of skill points specified in their Setting Pack to assign to skill ranks. No starting skill can have more than 2 skill ranks during character creation and no skill may ever go above 5 skill ranks. Use your pool of skill points and assign them to individual skills that you wish your character to be proficient in at the start of the story. Use your character idea to guide where you place the skill points.
  1. For example, Larry wants to create a classic, burly fighter in his fantasy campaign. He is given 10 skill points to start out, so he takes 2 ranks in Melee Combat, 2 ranks in Feats of Strength, 1 rank in Feats of Agility, 1 rank in Riding, 1 rank in Persuasion, and 2 ranks in Street Smarts. Since he took Human as a species earlier, he ends up with 2 ranks in Feats of Agility and Persuasion because the Human species is listed as starting with 1 rank in those skills in the Setting Pack.
Hit Points
1. Head to the Hit Points section of the rules to determine your characters hit points and list the result on your character sheet.
  1. Larry rolls 4d6 and gets a 6,5,3,4. He drops the 3 as the lowest roll and totals the other three results for 15 hit points. Larry has 2 ranks in Feats of Strength and adds that to the total for 17 total hit points that he lists on his character sheet. Since characters have a hit point limit of 20, his total of 17 is rather good and certainly fits hit burly fighter character idea.
To Hit
1. Your characters To Hit number is the Difficulty Class (DC) needed by your foes to hit you in combat. It is generated by adding your Feats of Agility rank to 15.
  1. Larry has 1 rank in Feats of Agility. Adding that to 15, Larry has a To Hit DC of 16 and marks that on his character sheet in the To Hit box.
Equipment
1. Your Setting Pack will contain a list of equipment, weapons, armor, mounts/vehicles, and other items you can purchase to outfit your character for adventure. It will also list the amount of starting funds your character has to spend in equipping themselves at the start of the campaign. Use these funds to purchase all the items you will need for your adventures that match up with your character idea.
  1. A recommended order for purchasing items to ensure you get the most important items before you run out of funds is:
    1. Armor: Assuming your setting has armor as a common element purchase it first as it tends to be one of the most expensive items and will dictate what kind of funds you have left for the rest of your kit.
    2. Weapons: Although role playing games are not all combat, it does generally make up a large part of the game and you want to ensure your character can defeat their enemies when needed. Often a weapon choice is a big part of defining your character. Do they want a sword so they can look their opponents in the eye or a bow so they can keep their opponents at a distance, or do they come from a tribe of horse-riding archers from the steppes?
    3. General Equipment: Now it is time to grab that tent, cooking utensils, food, water, backpack, med pack, laser drill, or whatever else you need to keep your character alive and useful during your adventures. Do not be surprised if you cannot afford everything you would like right off the bat and you end up with little to no funds when you are finished purchasing equipment, after all if you were super rich you probably would not have a good reason to be risking your life in adventures would you.
  2. Larry looks at his Setting Pack and finds that everyone starts out with 150 gold coins, so he purchases some decent leather armor, a longsword (he wants to be up close and personal in combat), a dagger, a backpack, some trail rations, water skin, rope, and few other items. Once he is done, he is left with 3 copper coins to his name. Time to find some adventure and glory and a chance to get rich.
Damage Reduction (DR)
1. Damage Reduction is explained fully in the Damage (DMG) section of the Combat rules. In most cases armor you just purchased or protection native to your species will provide points of DR. At this point you should be able to calculate your total DR and note it on your character sheet.
  1. Larry is Human, which provides no native DR, and he purchased a suit of leather armor that provides DR1. So, he lists 1 in the DR section of his character sheet.
Attacks
1. This area of your character sheet lists out the weapons and other types of attacks you can use in combat in their own area for quick reference. As you purchase your weapons your Setting Pack will detail aspects of the weapons that you can list in this section of the character sheet.
  1. Larry purchased a Longsword which is listed as dealing d8 DMG and the slashing property, so he lists those qualities in the first Attack row. He also has a dagger listed as dealing d4 DMG and the slashing property that he lists in the second Attack row. Both use his Melee Combat skill for attacks so he can list +2 for attack bonus in each row as he does not have any other bonuses to add to these attacks yet.
  2. Special Attacks are also listed in this section. Special Attacks available will be listed in your Setting Pack and will often derive from your species or a profession if your setting details them.
    1. Larry is Human and they do not have claws, sharp teeth, or other natural traits so he does not have any Special Attacks to list on his sheet.
Spells
1. If your setting includes magic or mental powers or something equivalent, use the rules in your Setting Pack to choose the spells you know already and list them here.
  1. Larry is a classic fighter and is a bit wary of magic. He has never learned how to use magic and he does not want to learn so he has no spells to list here.
Character Information
1. Here is where you can begin to flesh out some of your characters personality and backstory. Depending on how detailed your character idea is you might have a lot to write down here or nothing at all. It is highly recommended that your work with your GM on the following areas. They may have some advice based on the campaign setting or world history that could help you come up with interesting traits, and any GM worth a darn is going to want to incorporate these items into the story to raise the stakes of your personal drama.
  1. Personality Traits: Is your character shy, bold, flirty, likes to hang out in bars, or musically inclined? This is the place to list those traits so you can easily reference them as you play and bring them into the game sessions.
  2. Flaws: Nobody is perfect, and it is a good thing since a perfect character is not overly dramatic. Does your character have a gambling problem, a death mark on their heads, or do they fall in love with anyone that pays them a compliment? This is the place to list those flaws.
  3. Motivations: Why is your character taking on this dangerous way of life? Are they out to avenge the death of their mother, paying off a debt, discover the meaning of the alien artifacts, or tired of farm life and ready to see the world? This the place to list those motivations.
  4. Connections: Of all the places on your character sheet likely to start out blank, this is the most likely. Since you are just starting your adventuring life you might not know anybody in a meaningful enough way to list them here. However, maybe your motivation was to pay off a debt, so you would list the person you owe that debt to here. Perhaps you were in the local army for several years and just left to strike out on your own, likely you could list the army here as an organization you can turn to for assistance in the future.
2. Larry does not have a lot of detail in mind just yet, but he decides his character is a gruff, taciturn individual with a bounty on his head. He just wants to pay off the debt and make his own fortune so he can retire in luxury and his only real connections in the world are the man he owes his debt to and the head of a local thieves’ guild he just met that might have some work for him.
Name
1. Last, but certainly not least, give your character a name. Maybe you have had one in mind all along or maybe a good one came to mind as you created your character in the steps above. Your Setting Pack may have suggestions for your species or based on the country of origin for your character. If you are stuck for a good name or just not feeling creative, I highly recommend https://www.fantasynamegenerators.com. The site is a fantastic resource for generating great names for any genre, common species and races, and historical names from almost every culture to walk the Earth.
  1. Larry is all in with the classic, burly fighter so he names his character Grognar the Skullcrusher.