Character Creation Methods - New Campaign

[LordGraz'zt]

I am starting a new campaign soon - would be interested in hearing some different creation methods you have used in your campaigns to create interesting characters.

I would also be interested if you tried creating characters at the same time as the other players and how those types of group methods work.

The sort of things I am looking at is the little tricks you have used to make compelling characters - things like background options, tarot cards, methods that are a little bit different from the "standard".

 

[Stumblewyk]

I've always worked very closely with my players to create characters that have interesting, intriguing, and useful (to me as DM, anyway) ties to the game world. That's involved creating organizations and factions in my world that a player wanted to be a part of, noble families, and working cooperatively with my players on parts of world history.

As a player, I've been in a group where two PCs were brother and sister, and had an amusing sibling rivalry that spilled over from RP into combat. Really, in every case, it's boiled down the player being interested into making their character more real and more part of the world they "exist" in.

 

[renau1g]

I've had a few "non-standard" methods. My personal favourite is putting three races on cards and three classes on another set of cards. Then I put them into two "hats" and each person selects their combo out of them and we roll them up right after.

Ex.
Race Card 1: Human, Tiefling, Shardmind
Race Card 2: Elf, Halfling, Githrezai

Class Card 1: Fighter, Psion, Barbarian
Class Card 2: Ranger, Cleric, Battlemind

We had great fun with it, but my group's cool with that kind of method, not everyone would be.

We always made PC's as a group and it was tons more fun than doing it separately as we got to tell out story's while we sat around.

 

[Camelot]

I encourage my players to think of why they have the features, powers, feats, and trained skills that they do. Have them look past the mechanics and think of why their character would learn the ability. It helps coming up with a solid personality as well as background ideas.

Also, definitely create characters together as a group. Have each PC have relationships with at least two other characters, one positive and one negative.

As for little tricks, use the dice. Come up with a list of possible backgrounds and roll. Don't make players do this, as I'm sure many players like to come up with their backgrounds themselves, not randomly.​

 

[Dice4Hire]

I like a little randomness in my character creation.

Tarot cards are good, or I have a deck of Deadlands cards with monsters, situations etc that give me inspiration.

I also agree to make things up in a group, as people are more likely to tie things together, and have a much better idea of who each other are than if they make them up alone.

TO flesh out the background of higher level characters, I sometimes roll on those adventure tables in some of the 3.5 Complete books. Lotta good adventure ideas there.

 

[Herschel]

I like having them create their characters together. Pick a race, pick a role, pick a class, assign a 16 to the primary attack stat (pre-racial) and let the rest fall in to place.

 

[Dr_Ruminahui]

I've been in 3 campaigns where the DMs have randomly handed out pieces of paper that had campaign plot hooks on them. For the most part, they were plot hooks for the GM, though, and didn't really give the player any information to work with.

So in campaigns, I've had:

A human rogue with some kind of curse.
An elf paladin who had a demon sealed in him (I think - he never called on it).
A drow sorceress with got a mysterious mask in a dream.

Not sure on the exact details of each, as we never finished the campaigns.

As far as I know, only the first had any mechanical effects associated with it (he did more damage, and then when I got rid of the curse (don't remember how, it was back in 3.5), he got a bump to his charisma.

 

[ourchair]

I ask players to answer a ten item long questionnaire determining alignment, geographic origin and class inclinations and then triangulate that with blood type, astrological sign and tasseomancy.

 

[Infiniti2000]

Only 10 questions? I require 153. Also, I require the player demonstrate the capabilities of the class he or she is choosing for his or her character prior to allowing it in my game.

Not surprisingly, we have only PCs from the 3.x Commoner NPC class.

 

[ourchair]

Only 10 questions? I require 153. Also, I require the player demonstrate the capabilities of the class he or she is choosing for his or her character prior to allowing it in my game.

Not surprisingly, we have only PCs from the 3.x Commoner NPC class.

I tried that once, but it made all the handicapped/disabled min-maxers in my group upset that being 'crippled' doesn't mean they automatically get more points to spend on attributes and skills.