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Characters

How to set up the stats, classes, races, professions, skills, levels, perks and starting kit players build characters from, and how creation and respecs work.

For staff

This guide covers the pieces players build a character from. Set them up before players make characters, and come back when you add a class or rebalance levels. It all lives under Game Design › Characters.

The pages and the switches

Classes, Races, Professions and Perks open one page with a tab each, plus a Starting kit tab. Stats, Base values, Starting stats, Skills and Levels open a second page, also with a tab each.

Three settings under Server › Settings decide what counts. The classes page shows each one at the top.

  • hud-classSystem: class stats count. Class abilities count either way.
  • hud-raceSystem: race stats count. Race abilities count either way.
  • hud-perkSystem: perk stats count.

A good order to work in

  1. Stats, then their base values.
  2. Classes and races, with their stats and abilities.
  3. Starting stats and the points to spend.
  4. Skills and their pools.
  5. The level chart, then perks.
  6. The starting kit.
  7. Creation and respec settings.
  8. Make a test character on the HUD and on the website.

Stats

Stats lists every stat with its Code, Name and Order. Formulas and items use the code, so pick short codes and keep them. System stats keep their code.

Press Where used before you change or delete a stat. If you change a code, item bonuses move to the new one, but formulas have to be changed by hand. Deleting a stat takes it off everything except the formulas and item bonuses that name it.

Base values is a grid: stats down the side, Everyone, each class and each race across. A character’s stat is everyone’s value, plus their class’s and race’s, plus the points they spend, plus perks, gear and effects. Click a cell, type and press Enter. A blank cell clears it. Everyone’s abilities, below the grid, are abilities every character has.

Classes

Press New class:

  • Category: if classes have one, creation asks for the category first, then the class.
  • Description: shown at creation.
  • Armour it can wear: armour of another type can’t be equipped.
  • Starting row: front or back, where your game system uses rows.
  • Players can pick it at character creation: off makes it staff only.

Active is a marker only. Open the class to fill its lists:

  • Stats: a value and From level. The same stat at several levels adds up.
  • Abilities: each from a level.
  • Starting perks: given when a character of this class is made.
  • Skill points: the class’s own points for a skill category, in place of the category’s, with a Highest rank.
  • Allowed races: see below.

The Skills list isn’t used yet. You can’t delete a class while characters have it. If you offer no classes, new characters get the class called Default, so keep one by that name.

Races

A race has a Name, which also becomes the character’s species, a Description, an Order and Players can pick it at character creation. Open it to add Stats, Abilities and Starting perks. With no races at all, creation skips the race step.

Watch out: Allowed races works per race. Once a race appears on any class’s Allowed races, that race can only take the classes that list it. If you limit one class to Elves, add Elves to every other class Elves may take. A race’s Classes it can be shows the result.

Professions

A profession has a Code (blank makes one from the name), a Type, a Highest level and Players can pick it at character creation, where they start at level 1. An inactive profession can’t be picked. Recipes can need a level of it. XP per level sets what each level costs where the game system’s Profession Skill Gain rule is on. Its stats, perks, skills, classes and races lists aren’t used yet.

The profession settings are optional rules on Game Design › Combat & effects › Game systems. Find them with Search rules and settings:

  • Profession Rules: one main profession, a sub-profession from Professions: Sub-profession Level, gathering skills capped at Professions: Gathering Cap, and a letter of indenture to change the main one.
  • Profession Skill Gain: crafts give profession XP, and other professions stop at Skill Gain: Sub-profession Cap.

Starting stats and points

Starting stats lists the stats players spend points on at creation and level-ups, each with Shown as, a Description, Lowest and Highest. A new character starts each one at its lowest. The Points to spend box holds:

Setting What it does
statSum Points to spend at creation, above each stat’s lowest.
profile-statsBase What a level 1 character holds in all.
profile-statsPerStep Points each step gives.
profile-statsEveryLevels 0: a step every level. Above 0: a step every this many levels.
profile-statsMax The most in one stat after a level-up or respec. 0 is no cap.
profile-levelUpKeepStats A level-up only adds points. A respec still frees them.

Creation refuses a character unless every stat is between its lowest and highest and exactly statSum points are spent.

Tip: If the page says “These disagree”, a new character’s lowest values plus statSum don’t match what level 1 expects, so the first level-up asks them to spend or give back points. Change statSum or the lowest values until the warning goes.

Skills and skill pools

On Skills, a category is a pool. Press New category and set Points players spend here. A category with 0 points is hidden from players. Then add skills with New skill: a Code (its name in formulas), Category, Highest rank and Players can spend points on it. Once players spend every point and save, their skills lock until a respec.

Levels

Levels lists each Level, its XP needed and the Perk points it gives. A character reaches a level once their XP is at least its number. Stat points follow the settings above. hud-levelSystem lets players level up on the HUD, and hud-levelStats has them spend stat points there.

Fill levels builds the chart from From level, To level, First level’s XP, Each level grows (%), Plus each level, Round to and Perk points every N levels. Check the preview. Switch on Replace levels already on the chart only when you mean to.

Perks

A perk has Ranks and Needs level. At 2 or more, players can pick it at level-ups if you switch on perk picks. At 1, it’s only ever given.

  • Stats per rank: each rank has its own lines, which don’t add up. Shown as % only changes how it looks.
  • Gives abilities: from a rank and up.
  • Requirements: a level, a stat, another perk, a class or a race, for a rank and up. Lines in a group combine with AND or OR, set by the group’s first line. Every group must pass.

Perks are given by Everyone starts with on the Perks tab, a class’s or race’s Starting perks, the starting kit, and staff on a character’s page, who can skip requirements. If you switch on profile-perkPicks, players spend the level chart’s perk points on the HUD’s Perks page.

Starting kit

Each line is for Everyone or one class, and gives an Item, Coins or a Trait (perk). A blank Pick group means always given. Lines sharing a pick group are a choice, and the player picks one. Creation only offers items whose requirements their starting stats meet, and skips a group with nothing they can take. A group of traits only is optional. Coins are always given. Bound keeps a unique item’s copies with the character: no trading, giving, selling or looting.

Creation settings

  • hud-createChar: 1 makes characters on the HUD. 0 sends the player a link to the website instead. The website’s Create a character page offers the same choices either way.
  • createLabelRace, createLabelCategory, createLabelClass, createLabelProfession: the names of the creation dropdowns. They sit with statSum under Server › HUD settings, in the Char-Creation group.
  • profile-maxChars: the most characters per account. At present only moving a character to another account checks it, so creation doesn’t enforce it.
  • web-charSheetApproval: if you switch it on, character sheets need staff approval, and the titler shows when a sheet is waiting, sent back or denied.

Respecs

web-charRespec decides who can respec:

Value What players can do
0 Nothing. Only staff respec.
1 Respec, and re-spend stat points on Level Up at any time.
2 As 1, and change class.
3 Respec only through the Respec card, with its cost and wait.
  • profile-respecCost: what a player’s own respec costs, in the smallest coin. 0 is free.
  • profile-respecDays: days between a player’s own respecs.
  • profile-respecFreeBelowLevel: below this level, a player’s own respec is free and has no wait.
  • profile-classChangePerks: taking a new class also gives that class’s perks. Earlier classes’ perks stay.

A respec sets stat points back to 0, clears and unlocks skills, and takes back picked perks. Given perks stay. Staff respecs are free and don’t count towards the wait. In modes 1 and 2, players can move stat points without a respec, which gets round the cost and wait, so use mode 3 if respecs should cost something.

What players see

Players make characters on the HUD or the website, find their stats, skills and abilities on their character page, and level up on the HUD. The player guides below walk them through it.