I've been working on a new character for my friend's campaign for the past couple weeks, so I'll use him as an example...
first I start out with what class I want to play, basing that around what I anticipate the campaign to involve and what everyone else is playing. in this case, I decided on a wizard because it'll probably be a good mix of dungeon crawling and roleplaying, and I know my DM friend really likes wizards, so I figured he might appreciate having one at the table.
after that, I think of a generic character theme or idea... for my wizard, I was really thinking a steampunk-ish rake. once I have a theme down, I start looking for a prestige class that might fit it or some multi-classing options that could fit in. I found techsmith in a book, which is perfect for my character idea, and I got my DM to agree to drop the "cleric" requirement as long as I was a gnome since we're not playing FR anyways. this way, when it comes time to decide on feats and skills, I can keep the PrC in mind.
once that's done, I start laying out a generic framework for my character's background. I'm thinking my gnome is from humble beginings, but always had an insatiable desire to learn everything there is to know, which led him to pursuing the arcane path (and eschewing magic specialization) and eventually led him to leave the comfort of his mountain home to discover everything out there waiting to be discovered. (still a work in progress)
once alllllllllll that is done, I whip out the character sheet, start rolling stats, assigning skill-points, feats, etc all with my characters background and planned future in mind.
first I start out with what class I want to play, basing that around what I anticipate the campaign to involve and what everyone else is playing. in this case, I decided on a wizard because it'll probably be a good mix of dungeon crawling and roleplaying, and I know my DM friend really likes wizards, so I figured he might appreciate having one at the table.
after that, I think of a generic character theme or idea... for my wizard, I was really thinking a steampunk-ish rake. once I have a theme down, I start looking for a prestige class that might fit it or some multi-classing options that could fit in. I found techsmith in a book, which is perfect for my character idea, and I got my DM to agree to drop the "cleric" requirement as long as I was a gnome since we're not playing FR anyways. this way, when it comes time to decide on feats and skills, I can keep the PrC in mind.
once that's done, I start laying out a generic framework for my character's background. I'm thinking my gnome is from humble beginings, but always had an insatiable desire to learn everything there is to know, which led him to pursuing the arcane path (and eschewing magic specialization) and eventually led him to leave the comfort of his mountain home to discover everything out there waiting to be discovered. (still a work in progress)
once alllllllllll that is done, I whip out the character sheet, start rolling stats, assigning skill-points, feats, etc all with my characters background and planned future in mind.
