Stratos the Clumsy

Stratos is a new resident of Malia settling in the city of Ceraiathon only 5 months ago. Originally from the north east group of kingdoms known collectively as the Western Empire Stratos traveled to Malia for both a change in scenery and because of a divine feeling compelling him to leave.

Stratos brought with him a small fortune which he used to purchase a newly developed boarding residence in Ceraiathon. He spends most of his time endevouring to learn the local dialect of Malia, tasting the local teas and helping out his new community.

Stratos is well known in the developing district of Ceraiathon as a loud spoken man with a foreign accent who is particularly adept at banging his knees, toes and skins on just about every piece of household object in sight. Stratos's clumsy nature has given him a rather high tolerance for pain as banging his extremities on unsuspecting furnishings and cursing loudly in Highland Tongue are at least a daily occurrence.

Recently Stratos has heard of several interesting local tales from the local tavern. Tales of an old temple, a cursed ruins and an active dragon have particularly piqued his interest, Stratos has resolved that once he knows the local dialect a little better he will find some companions to explore these exciting places and purge any evil that lies within.

Creating the Concept

Based on the short story above we can fill out Stratos's basic info part of the character sheet with the concept of "Clumsy holy warrior" in mind.

We have chosen that Stratos worships Valerious god of heroes, honour and courage and filled out the other parts of the basic information.

At this stage we also decided to fill out Stratos's virtues as well. Virtues are chosen by the player and approved by the GM. All virtues at 2 are considered fairly 'normal'.

Since Stratos will priestly spell caster we have also filled out the other boxes (note: this information is covered in Chapter 7: Priest Spells).

Allocating Attributes

Here we get to assign our 16 attribute points. The image on the left shows the maximum possible for attributes based on race. The maximum for most races for most attributes is 6. In this case Stratos is a human so there are no changes to the basic stats.

On the right we have those assigned attributes. Stratos is quite tough from the constant injuries due to his clumsiness.

Here we can see how we have spent the 15 skill points;

3 in Melee
3 in Theology
1 in Wilderness Lore
1 in Literacy
2 in Combat Style: Sword and Shield
1 increasing Athletics
1 increasing Awareness
1 increasing Fortitude
2 increasing Will

Assigning skills

Before allocating any of the 15 skill points, a player needs to work out how many additional ‘dots’ their character will have due to ability rounding.

Next to each ability on the character sheet there are three letters written in brackets. These three letters represent one of the attributes (example ‘Str’ is strength). The attribute represent the Natural Talent for that ability. Each of the character’s abilities start with half (rounded down) of their Natural Talent. This is shown filled in on the left image.

At this stage we cannot go beyond 3 'dots'. The exception to this is if a character’s race forces the stat above 4 (i.e. that character has 3 in that ability because of ability rounding and has a racial bonus (see book for more details)).

Choosing Feats

Starting characters get to pick 3 standard feats. The character must fulfil all the prerequisites for these feats by the end of character creation. Stratos is a human and gains one extra feat at character creation.

There are OVER 200 feats to choose from each based one of the 16 Trained skills/Abilities! All of these feats are written in chapter 5 of Ascendant Destiny.

For Stratos we have chosen the feats Powerful Strike, Spiritual Essence, Toughness and Courage.

Spending Freebie Points

Freebie Points are a mechanic used to round a starting character off. Freebie Points can be spent to improve your character in any way of your choosing (within limits of course).

Because the human is quite a basic race it gets 13 freebie points to spend during character creation!

For Stratos we have chosen to spend those points in the following way:

3 in improving Essence stat
1 in raising Melee skill to 4
1 in raising Theology to 4
1 in raising Wilderness Lore
1 in raising Literacy
1 in raising Athletics to 4
3 in purchasing the 'Paladinhood' magic feat
2 in purchasing six 1st level priest spells: Bless, Remove Pain, Create Water, Calm Emotions, Bless Weapon and Invigorate.

Calculating Derived Stats and Finishing Touches

The formulas for calculating Derived Stats is located in chapter 11 of Ascendant Destiny. We have filled out Stratos's Derived stats.

In the final character sheet we have also filled out some of the other details including equipment, weapons/armour and racial details.