Just for the sake of completeness, because it's an option, and because I'm like<em>SUPER BAD</em>at deciding on a character, I'm going to be making both a Fighter and a Wizard. I'm including a walk-through of my decisions as well. I'm going to assume we handle Races later in the process!<br/><br/><div class="floatleft">(https://78.media.tumblr.com/12d75417b61f1571ae2244cca055eeec/tumblr_oyav3jSR4b1utyn51o1_500.jpg)</div><div class="floatright">(https://78.media.tumblr.com/bd040b7ee06e8bd83420093f2678a6ae/tumblr_oyav3jSR4b1utyn51o2_r1_1280.png)</div><div class="spoiler_container"><div class="spoiler_header" onclick="hideSecond (this);" role="button">Fighter</div><div class="spoiler_body">Fighters always make me feel "old-school." get your axe and helmet, hire a guy to carry a torch, and dive into the Caves of Chaos, right? With that in mind, I'm going to start off by <em>rolling</em> my ability scores. because that never goes wrong!<br/><br/>Result: 5, 4, 4, 6,  (https://elliquiy.com/forums/dicebot.php?r=109171) = 15<br/>Result: 2, 6, 3, 6, (https://elliquiy.com/forums/dicebot.php?r=109170) = 15<br/>Result: 1, 5, 2, 6,  (https://elliquiy.com/forums/dicebot.php?r=109169) = 13<br/>Result: 3, 3, 3, 3, (https://elliquiy.com/forums/dicebot.php?r=109168) = 9<br/>Result: 1, 5, 6, 2, (https://elliquiy.com/forums/dicebot.php?r=109167) = 13<br/>Result: 1, 3, 4, 1,  (https://elliquiy.com/forums/dicebot.php?r=109166) = 8<br/><br/>...Well, that's not <em>amazing</em>, but it <em>is</em> very slightly better than what I would have gotten with point buy, and nothing is below 8, which is nice. Now comes the tricky part; determining what stat goes where.<br/><br/>Primary concern for a fighter is, of course, Fighting. My first decision is going to be figuring out how this character hits things, which will determine their primary combat ability. If I want to swing a big axe with two hands, all I will need is Strength. If I want to launch a hail of arrows, Dexterity is key. If, however, I want to dual wield or play a swashbuckle-y fencer kind of character, I would need Dexterity and Strength both. Having played more than my share of dual-wielding, fancy footworking characters (I usually play rogues), I'm going to give that last one a pass and focus on either using one big weapon or ranged combat. Since I rarely see them, I think my fighter is going to focus on ranged attacks. I'm going to put a 15 into my Dexterity<br/><br/>Next concern is defenses; If i'm in the back line chucking arrows or bolts or knives or whatever, I should (hopefully) not be taking too many knocks to the face. My Dexterity being high is going to help with my Armor Class too, which is nice; Still, I want those yummy, yummy hit points, so my other 15 is going to go into Constitution. <br/><br/>(Note for fighters; you will eventually be wearing big heavy armor, which constrains your movement somewhat and penalizes your Dexterity. Other classes that wear this stuff usually go low on Dexterity and let the armor cover them. Fighters however, get some class abilities later on that reduce the penalties of heavy armor, making Dexterity a worthwhile investment)<br/><br/>Next up, even if i'm going to be shooting arrows or whatever, I don't want my strength to be <em>bad</em>; some bows let me add strength to damage, thrown weapons do this automatically, and even Legolas whipped out a sword now and then. One of those 13's is going into Strength.<br/><br/>And now we come to the brain stuff; Intelligence, Charisma, and Wisdom. And those low scores are going to annoy me. <br/><br/>First off, I'm not worried about Charisma; the character that's forming in my head isn't exactly the most outgoing and charming of people. I'm just going to plop that 8 right there.<br/><br/>Intelligence and Wisdom are a pain, though; Intelligence determines how many bonus skill points I will get, and since fighters start off with very few, I don't want to hurt that too much. On the other hand, Wisdom determines the characters' mental defenses which, again, aren't that great to start with on a fighter! I think that for the moment, Wisdom is the more important of the two though; we're going ot have wizards to do all the brain-good-thinking stuff, right?<br/><br/>So at the end my stats are<br/><br/><strong>STR:</strong> 13<br/><strong>DEX:</strong> 15<br/><strong>CON:</strong> 15<br/><strong>INT:</strong> 9<br/><strong>WIS:</strong> 13<br/><strong>CHA:</strong> 8<br/><br/><hr/><br/><strong>Name:</strong> Sävel Tullerorimo<br/><strong>Class:</strong> Fighter<br/><br/><strong>Background:</strong>  Sävel grew up hearing the tales of wars that drove orcs and goblins from the land. Tales of glory told at festival, boasts that spilled out of the tavern, even lurid tales from other children that were mostly make-believe. The history there, and the risk of the greenskins' return, inspired Sävel to join the village militia, just in case. Trained in blade and bow, Sävel swore to the safety of the community. As time wore on though, the young warrior began to think. <em>We</em> had driven <em>them</em> from these lands. That didn't sound right. Surely those old drunks in the tavern had been embellishing hteir stories for years, to the point of total fiction. Maybe - <em>just maybe</em> - those orcs weren't really as bad as that. Knowing hte village elders would never give leave, Sävel and four friends snuck out one night to probve their idealistic theory. Two days later they crossed the hills into the Pomarj territories where the goblinoids lived.<br/><br/>  Maybe Sävel should have listened less to the mayor and tavern talespinners, and more to grandfather when he mourned his lost friends and recounted his own scars. The orcs of the Pomarj did not care for tresspassers or thieves, and it was only through sheer luck that Sävel managed to escape the fate of the others, and return to the village. There was no sanctuary there; the elders judged Sävel harshly (and rightly) - Sneaking off to the orc lands had killed four members of the community and worse, might have riled hte orcs into attack!  Fortunately that worry never came to pass... but for the foolish, childish stunt, Sävel was cast out, exiled with nothing more than a pack of food and a map to the city of Tringlee.<br/><br/>  The time since has been spent largely in dalliances; Sävel found a fondness for horses and even dabbled in architecture, and apprenticed for a time under the armorsmiths of Tringlee. There have been moments of battle, mostly from excursions to the southeast, providing guardianship for some expedition or other. Sävel has learned the finer points of slaying orcs, and not being slain in turn. At this moment, Sävel is "between jobs" (i.e., a broke mercenary) and the Blue Mouse Inn is owned by an acquaintance, so maybe those last few coppers can at least keep a roof between Sävel's head and the rain.</div></div><div style="text-align: right;"><div class="spoiler_container"><div class="spoiler_header" onclick="hideSecond (this);" role="button">Wizard</div><div class="spoiler_body"><div style="text-align: left;">For the wizard, I'm definitely going to use Point-buy. The chance of rolling an 18 just isn't worth the risk of rolling a bunch of 7's or something. <br/><br/>Wizards are pretty straightforward, so there's not much dithering over what points go where. Intelligence First, then either Constitution or Dexterity for defense, and then everything else is flavortown.<br/><br/><strong>STR:</strong> 10 - The wizard's not swinging a sword or the like. I might also make them a gnome, so I don't want to <em>crater</em> strength; encumbrance is a thing in Pathfinder!<br/><strong>DEX:</strong> 14 - The first defense is getting the hell out of the way!<br/><strong>CON:</strong> 12 - if a wizard is getting hit, they're having a bad day, and 1 or 2 extra HP won't help <em>too much</em>. I want this positive for the Fortitude saves though! <br/><strong>INT:</strong> 16 - Intelligence is a Wizard's spellcasting stat... and since a Wizard is nothing BUT spells, this needs to be solid. <br/><strong>WIS:</strong> 8 - I kind of want to go the "too smart for their own good" route here. It helps that Wizards don't really use Wisdom for much, except Will saves; and their base will save is good, soooo. <br/><strong>CHA:</strong> 10 - I already made a gruff, taciturn kind of character in the fighter. Wizards don't use charisma for any-damn-thing, but still, no sense in having two of the same thing!<br/><br/>One thing to note with spellcasters in general; you don't actually <em>need</em> your spellcasting stat to be as high as it can go, at least not at 1st level. Nice if you can get it, sure, but it's always good to "round out" a bit before trying to reach the pinnacle. The best thing about a high casting stat is that it makes your spells harder to resist. However at the low levels, a lot of your really good spells are things like buffs to your party, monster-summoning spells, and environment-altering spells, things that don't actually require a saving throw. So you can get away with a fairly low castign stat, in favor of defensive abilitie. As you level, you will get bonuses to your stats, which will help you expand your spellcasting a fair bit!<br/><br/><hr/><br/><strong>Name:</strong> Ellywick "Fnicket" Rombdoozle<br/><strong>Class:</strong> Wizard<br/><br/><strong>Background:</strong> Ellywick hails from Ostrava, in the Kingdom of Munt. She will assure you that this is somewhere far away and isn't particularly relevant except for one thing. Growing up in the big city, Ellywick learned one very important lesson; the best way to success is to be almost as good as you make people think you are. If you indulge their expectations and perform adequately, they'll really think you're as impressive as you claimed. it's weird, but true, and if you'll buy that, she has a pamphlet for you. She's always had a knack for the illusory arts; being a gnome, how could she not? Of course, being a gnome, in the city of Ostrava, in the kingdom of Munt, you don't always get the opportunities of say, a human. The wizards of the High Academie Polvela had a dim view of gnomes in general, and when some patch-kneed tailor's daughter came in and offered a card trick, well... Ellywick was hustled out. And she just hustled herself right back in. Four times, in fact. Each time she managed to "find" a scroll or student's notes, or something else of use.<br/><br/>For a while now Ellywick - or Fnicket the Fabulous - has been using these notes and ledgers to put on a bit of a show, to win her supper, and to amaze the masses. But the truth is, she knows she can do more. She's hit a wall and wants to be a better wizard; after all, she has to be at least almost as good as she says she is! Sadly, most of the academies in Munt take their orders from the High Academie, so Ellywick has had to travel afield, to the rustic (podunk) Free Wizards' College in this atmospheric (damp and dreary) corner of the land, where hopefully lessons will not revolve around magically cleaning pig stalls. How does she plan to get in? well, she's accumulated a fine store of arcane wares, mysterious powders and, after a con gone wrong, a crate of glassware. That, plus her natural talents ought to be more than enough to get her in the door, right? After all if you can't wow them with wonders, baffle them with bullshit!</div></div></div></div>