Connections are something granted by careers. If you look under the advancement options for Gun Mage, there's one called Connections (gun mage order). That's what that is.<br/><br/>You do add together your skills from your combined starting careers.<br/><br/>Agility, Prowess, and Poise have to be raised separately, but derived stats like Defense and your life spiral go up whenever any of the associated stats go up.<br/><br/>In addition to the +1 you get for being human, everybody gets +3 stat points too. That's tucked away on page 150, where the character creation steps abruptly pick back up after the careers list ends.<br/><br/>I hope that helps!