Roll Up a D&D Character Here! (Examples for D&D Noob

[Ragorn]

In this thread, you can roll up your own level one 3.5 edition D&D character. I'll walk you through the process step by step so you can see how things work in tabletop D&D. I'll be referencing the online d20 SRD document, which explains the rules and gives you information on the races and classes available in the game.

Anything I write in blue text is something you'll need to reference when building your character sheet at the end of the exercise.

I'm going to skip some stuff you'd normally figure out, like initiative. We don't know how some stats will apply to Toril, and you don't need to calculate EVERY little detail to roll up an effective character.

Step One: Choose Your Class
Everything else makes more sense once you've chosen your class. A list of base classes can be found here. You may pick any of the bases classes on the list. Your base class will determine your weapon and armor proficiency, your Base Attack Bonus, your saving throws, the spells and special abilities you have access to, the number of skill points you get and the skills you can use them on, and the size of the die you will roll to determine your hit points.

Class:
Base Attack Bonus:

Step Two: Choose Your Attributes
This is where you determine your character's Str, Dex, Con, Int, Wis, and Cha. A description of the attributes can be found at the top of the second column of this page. You have 28 stat points to spend however you'd like. The rules are as follows:

- Every attribute starts at 8 and may not go lower during this step of character creation.
- If an attribute is 8-13, it costs one stat point to increase the attribute by one.
- If an attribute is 14-15, it costs two stat points to increase the attribute by one.
- If an attribute is 16-17, it costs three stat points to increase the attribute by one.
- You may not increase an attribute past 18 during this step of character creation.

For example, taking a Strength of 14 costs six points. Increasing your Strength to 16 costs a total of 10 points (six to reach 14, then two points each for 14->15 and 15->16).

Strength is useful for classes who want to hit things. Dexterity improves your armor class and Reflex save, and helps you hit with ranged weapons. Constitution gives you more hit points and improves your Fortitude save. Intelligence gives you more skill points, and gives Wizards their spells. Wisdom gives Clerics, Rangers, Paladins, and Druids their spells, impacts the effectiveness of a Monk's special attacks, and improves your Will save. Charisma gives Bards and Sorcerers their spells, affects undead turning for Clerics and Paladins, and has various effects for some classes.

All attributes also affect their respective skills. A high Dexterity will make you better at Opening Locks, for example (see Skills).

Your attribute bonus starts at 0 for a score of 10, and increases by 1 for every two points you have in an attribute (rounded down). Thus, a score of 8-9 would give you a -1 penalty, a 13-14 would give you +2, and a 16-17 would be a +3. Usually, it is advantageous to give yourself even attributes to maximize your bonuses.

Be sure to make a note of your attribute bonuses, as well as the raw attribute scores. Note that these scores are NOT final.

Strength:
Dexterity:
Constitution:
Intelligence:
Wisdom:
Charisma:

Step Three: Choose Your Race
Once you've decided on a class, you can pick an appropriate race. The list of available races is in the center of this page. Your race determines your movement speed, bonuses/penalties to your starting attributes, your Favored Class (see below), your character's size, and any race-specific special skills or abilities you will have access to. For example, Humans are given a free feat and extra skill points, while Elves are immune to sleep and have an easier time detecting secret doors.

Favored Class is used when multi-classing, and probably won't have any impact on Toril. If your character is a member of your race's favored class, you may multi-class without an experience penalty.

Step Four: Apply Your Racial Modifiers and Calculate Final Totals
Some races have modifiers which are applied to your base attributes. Now is a good time to apply those modifiers. If you gave yourself a Strength of 16, and chose Half-Orc as your race (+2 Str, -2 Wis, -2 Cha), you would now increase your Strength to 18.

Note that attribute scores are not race-specific... a Gnome with 10 Intelligence is exactly as smart as a Half-Orc with 10 Intelligence.

These scores are final, and you can write them on your character sheet.

Strength:
Dexterity:
Constitution:
Intelligence:
Wisdom:
Charisma:

Now that you know your final attribute totals, your race, and your class, you can calculate a lot of other information about your character as well. Let's do it:

- For saving throws, go back to your Class page and find the bonuses for a first-level character. Add your Constitution modifier to the Fortitude save, add your Dexterity modifier to your Reflex save, and add your Wisdom modifier to your Will save.

For example, a Cleric with 16 Wisdom will have a Will save of +5 (+2 from being a first-level Cleric, and 16 means a +3 Wisdom modifier, which we add in).

Fortitude Save:
Reflex Save:
Will Save:

What does this mean? Every spell effect and trap has a Difficulty Class (DC) assigned to it. When a save is necessary, you roll 1d20 and add your saving throw modifier to the roll. If you roll equal to or higher than the DC, you make the save. Higher modifiers are better!

- Roll up your hit points. Look on the appropriate Class page for the die you use to determine your hit points. At level 1, all characters are treated as having rolled the maximum... congratulations! Now add your Constitution modifier to your hit points, and write it down.

Hit Points:

Step Five: Feats
Head over to this page and look at the list of available feats. You can pick almost any feat on the list, but some feats have pre-requisites. For example, Cleave gives you a free attack if you deal the killing blow on another mob, but it requires you to have Strength 13+, as well as the Power Attack feat.

For being the special little snowflake you are, you get to pick one feat. You'll get to pick another feat at 3rd level, and then every 3 levels thereafter (6, 9, etc). If you picked Human as your race, you're extra special, and you get a free bonus feat at level one, so pick two feats.

Spellcasters may want to have a look at the Metamagic Feats over on the right hand side. Metamagic Feats let you modify the effects of your spells, making them deal more damage or last longer. To compensate, you cast the spells at a higher level than normal.

Feat(s):

Step Six: Skills
Picking skills is a long and complicated process. First, look at your Class page to see how many skill points you're entitled to. You'll see something like "2+Int," which means that you get 2 skill points per level, plus your Intelligence Modifier (so a Wizard with 16 Intelligence would get 5 skill points per level). Fighters and casters get few skill points, hybrid classes like Rangers and Bards get more, and Rogues get the most (8+Int every level).

At level 1, to reflect your character's total life experience, you get four times the usual number of skill points. So our Wizard with 16 Int would get 20 skill points at level 1, and then 5 skill points every level thereafter.

Humans get +1 skill point per level, regardless of class.

Skill Points per Level:

You must spend ALL of your skill points every time you level, as soon as you gain a level.

Check out this page for a list of available skills. Each class has a list of "in-class skills" found on the appropriate Class page. You may purchase ranks in any in-class skill at a rate of one to one, so our Wizard may spend 4 skill points to get 4 ranks in Concentration. You may spend 2 skill points to get 1 rank in any skill not on your class's list. These "out of class" skills are commonly called "cross-class skills." So our Wizard can spend 4 skill points to get 2 ranks in Tumble.

There is a level cap on how high your skills can go. The cap is 3+level for in-class skills, and (3+level)/2 for cross-class skills. This is the same for all characters regardless of race or class. So our first-level Wizard cannot have more than 4 ranks in Spellcraft (an in-class skill), nor can he have more than 2 ranks in Search (a cross-class skill).

Each skill is associated with an attribute. You'll see the associated attribute on the skills page, as well as on your class page in your list of in-class skills. You add your attribute modifier to the number of ranks you put in a skill to determine your final bonus.

Finally, some races give skill bonuses. For example, Elves get a bonus to Listen, Search, and Spot. Consult the appropriate Race Page to see if you get any bonuses.

Ready for a final example? Let's say I'm an Elven Wizard with 16 Intelligence. I get 20 skill points at level 1, and 5 skill points for every level thereafter. I decide I want to spend 4 skill points to increase my Search skill. What is my final modifier?

Well, according to the Wizard Page, Search is cross-class for me. So spending 4 skill points only gets me 2 ranks in the skill. Let's calculate my bonus.

+2 (from my 4 skill points)
+3 (Search is an Int-based skill, and my 16 Int gives me a +3 bonus)
+2 (I'm an Elf, and Elves get +2 to Search according to the Elf page.

My total Search modifier is +7.

Like saving throws, using your skills involves exceeding a Difficulty Class (DC) based on what you're trying to accomplish. Finding a secret door might be a DC 15 Search check. In this case, I roll 1d20 and add +7. If I get 15 or higher, I find the secret door.

Complicated enough for you? Don't worry. Most online character sheets calculate all of your skills automagically. You just tell it how many skill points you want to spend, and the sheet takes care of in- or cross-class, attribute bonuses, and racial bonuses for you.

Oh by the way... certain skills also get synergy bonuses. If you have 5 or more ranks in Bluff, you get a free +2 bonus to Sleight of Hand checks as well. All this information can be found in the skill description, but it's too complicated for me to discuss all the various synergies here. This is why automated character sheets are the way to go, it's impossible to remember all these bonuses manually!

Skills:

Step Seven: Pick Spells
If you're a Bard, Cleric, Druid, Sorcerer, or Wizard, you start at level 1 with spellcasting ability. Rangers and Paladins gain spellcasting ability at level 4.

Check out your Class page again. There will be a chart indicating how many spells per day you get at level one. There are a couple things that depend on your class, so let me skip around a little:

- Clerics, Druids, Rangers, and Paladins memorize spells at the start of the day. They may choose their spells from the entire list of available first level spells. This is exactly how Clerics and Druids work on Toril right now, you don't need a spellbook. All divine spellcasting classes use Wisdom for their spellcasting stat.

- Clerics also pick two "Domains" at first level. Each Domain gives you access to one Domain spell per level. If you look at the Cleric page, you'll see that the chart is listed with a "+1" for every spell level. If this sounds confusing, click the link and it will become clearer.

My first-level Cleric picks the Air and Animal Domains. According to the chart on the Cleric page, I can memorize 1+1 spells at first level. So, I pick one spell of my choice from the Cleric spell list. And then, for my Domain spell, I pick either Obscuring Mist (the first-level spell choice from the Air domain) or Calm Animals (the first-level spell choice from the Animal domain). Domain spell choices are often spells not found on the general Cleric spell list, so Domains can be used to customize your character a bit. The Travel Domain, for example, gives a Cleric the ability to cast Fly, Dimension Door, and Teleport as Domain spells!

Domain spells cannot be memorized in non-Domain slots. You get one Domian spell slot per spell level.

- Clerics can also spontaneously cast cure spells. What this means is, no matter WHAT spell you memorized, you can cast the "cure" spell of the same level instead. So if you memorize Bless, you can cast Cure Light Wounds instead. You never need to memorize cure spells! This ONLY applies to Clerics.

- Wizards memorize their spells at the start of the day. Wizards may only memorize spells that exist in their spellbook. Wizards will (almost) never have the entire list of first-level spells in their spellbook, so the selection of spells they have at their disposal is somewhat limited. There is no hard limit to the number of spells a Wizard may have in his spellbooks, but just like on Toril, spellbooks have a finite size. If you want every spell, you may need to lug a set of encyclopedias around with you :) Wizards use Intelligence for their spellcasting stat.

- Bards and Sorcerers cast spontaneously. This means that they get a certain number of "spell slots" every day, and they may choose which spell to cast at the time they cast the spell. Bards and Sorcerers have access to a very limited number of spells at each level, found on the Spells Known chart on the appropriate class page. For example, a 1st level Sorcerer can cast 3 spells per day, and he may know 2 first level spells. So my Sorcerer might know Magic Missile and Burning Hands, and he can choose to cast either one of those two spells up to 3 times per day. My Sorcerer cannot cast Mage Armor, at all, ever, because he doesn't know that spell. Bards and Sorcerers choose which spells to learn at level-up, and do not need to carry a spellbook. Bards and Sorcerers use Charisma as their spellcasting stat.

You also gain bonus spells per day based on the attribute bonus of your spellcasting attribute. You can see a bonus spell chart on this page. Basically, you get a bonus spell for every level up to and including your attribute modifier. So if I have 16 Int, I have a +3 Int modifier, and I get a bonus spell per day of first, second, and third level (if I can cast spell of those levels).

Step Eight: Wipe Hands on Pants
At this point, you'd probably buy equipment and calculate your armor class. But we're not going to bother with any of that. We're done! Your character is created, and you're mostly ready to play.

[Arilin Nydelahar]

Wow. Thanks Rags.

I'm looking at it all right now. It's slightly overwhelming for a firsttimer :P Already know what I want, just got to figure out how to record everything nicely.

Been looking for printable character sheets, anyone got a good site?

[Ragorn]

http://www.sylnae.net/3eprofiler/

Here is what Ragorn looks like. I rolled this character up in about 3 minutes. All the skill stuff is done for you, the attribute modifiers are calculated, and some things I didn't really touch on (like melee attack bonus and such) are auto-generated.

[Gormal]

This is incredibly cool, Joe. Want to roll for your babies?

[Arilin Nydelahar]

It is damn cool :P I'm messing with a character sheet right now. Still lost, but ok! I'm way to used to Toril. Looking at the classes and races, is there anything such as race restricted classes? I'm not seeing any, I do see the favored, but mines not a favored for any race :P

[Ragorn]

It is damn cool :P I'm messing with a character sheet right now. Still lost, but ok! I'm way to used to Toril. Looking at the classes and races, is there anything such as race restricted classes? I'm not seeing any, I do see the favored, but mines not a favored for any race :P

No. Any race can play any class. The Favored Classes are just a suggestion, and are used only for multiclassing. Here's a brief rundown of what it actually means:

At any time in your character's progression, you can take a level in any class you want. If you're a 12th level Fighter, you can take your 13th level in Wizard if you really want to. You're free to do whatever you want.

If you advance in all of your classes evenly, there's no experience penalty. HOWEVER! If you multi-class, and your classes are more than one level apart, you suffer a -20% penalty to all experience you receive. So a Fighter 5/Rogue 4 has no penalty to experience. If you level up again and take a level in Fighter, you become a Fighter 6/Rogue 4. Your classes are now more than one level apart, and you suffer -20% experience.

Your Favored Class just doesn't count at all when determining your multiclassing penalty. An Elf's Favored Class is Wizard, so you don't even consider your Wizard levels when deciding whether you get penalized. So an Elven Wizard 12 can take a level in Fighter if he wants to, with no penalty. Likewise, a Fighter 12 can take a level in Wizard if he wants.

Elf Wizard 12/Fighter 2/Rogue 1 OK! (Your Wizard levels don't count, and your other classes are within one level)
Elf Fighter 8/Rogue 7/Wizard 3 OK! (Same)
Elf Fighter 8/Wizard 3/Rogue 2 NOT OK! (Your Fighter and Rogue classes are more than one level apart)

Humans and Half-Elves are versatile creatures, and your highest class level is ignored when determining multiclass penalty, no matter what class it happens to be. A Human Fighter can take a level in Rogue, a Human Cleric can take a level in Bard, whatever you want. You can still get into penalty trouble if you take three different classes, because only your HIGHEST class level is ignored:

Human Wizard 12/Fighter 5/Rogue 1

This guy suffers an exp penalty. We ignore his Wizzy class, but his Fighter and Rogue classes are still more than a level apart.

Finally, unless otherwise specified on the class page, you can play any class with any ALIGNMENT you want either. Yes, you can play a Lawful Good Rogue or a Chaotic Evil Ranger if you want. Barbarians, Bards, Druids, Monks, and Paladins have some restrictions, but only Paladins force you into one particular alignment.

[Arilin Nydelahar]

Here's the one I made.

No idea if doing anything remotely right, but yeah!

[Cirath]

Here's the one I made.

No idea if doing anything remotely right, but yeah!

Other than not adding your wisdom bonus to AC due to being a monk, and not adding any equipment (some DMs run games where flint and steel will save your life, some just assume you can pull anything mundane from behind your back like Bugs Bunny, and some don't leave combat long enough to care about anything but weapons and armor) everything looks correct to me.

Just for the sake of ease of reference, you may want to list at least your unarmed attack statistics in your first weapon slot as well.

[Ragorn]

Here's the one I made.

No idea if doing anything remotely right, but yeah!

Suggestion for your stats. And I even have an easy way to phrase it for Toril peeps.

D&D stats notch on even numbers, so you always want to make sure you have even-numbered stats when possible. I would knock your Dex down to 16... you'll keep your +3 bonus, because 16 is the stat notch. Then you'll be able to reallocate 3 of your points, so bump Str and Wis both up to 14 to get the +2 notch, and move Con up to 12 to get the +1 notch.

I didn't really talk about Armor Class or equipment, but Cirath is right... Monks get their Wisdom bonus added to their Armor Class, so Arilin the Monk would have a 15 Armor Class right out of the gate (10 + 3 for Dex + 2 for Wis).

[Arilin Nydelahar]

Corrected and updated!

Hrm.

How different is 3.0 from 3.5? I have the PHB/DM Guide for 3.0, just not sure how much different between the two. Mostly curious for reference and what not.

[Ragorn]

Err... it's hard to say.

Imagine you take Algebra in high school. You work with the material for a year, and when you're done, you know enough about Algebra to pass the test.

Then, the next year, they hand you the same Algebra book, except that 10% of the formulas have changed slightly, and there's no easy reference that lists all of the new changes.

That's 3.0 -> 3.5. You can get a good feel for the mechanics from a 3.0 book, but you'll have to be ready to make minor-moderate changes to the way things work when you upgrade to 3.5.

[Ragorn]

I've updated Ragorn with some basic weapons and armor. You can see a list of basic weapons available here. If you're looking for stats on armor, this is the page you want to visit.

Ragorn carries a longsword and heavy wooden shield as his melee equipment. You can see how I've laid out the statistics for my weapons and armor based on the information in the charts I linked.

I should probably do a full writeup about equipment, if I have time later today I'll give a full explanation.

[Cirath]

I only skimmed over Ragorn's original post the first time, but having read it a bit more closely, I feel there is something he left out (or, rather, a second option he neglected to mention):

There are several methods for creating ability scores in the various Players Handbooks (as well as a number of homebrew methods that I have encountered over the years). The one mentioned in this thread is essentially what will be used for Toril 2.0. However, Some people, (myself included) are not fond of the point buy method, so I thought I would insert the standarnd rolling method as well. This will give you less control over your individual scores, but more potential for greatness (or mediocrity).

"To create an ability score for your character, roll four six-sided dice (4d6). Disregard the lowest die roll and total the three highest ones. The result is a number between 3 (horrible) and 18 (tremendous). The average for a typical commoner is 10 or 11, but your character is not typical. The most common ability scores for player characters (PCs) are 12 and 13. (That's right, the average player is above average.)

"Make this roll six times, recodring each result on a piece of paper. Once you have six scores, assign each score to one of the six abilities. At this step you need to know what kind of person your character is going to be, including his or her race and class, in order to know how best to distribute the ability scores. Choosing a race other than human or half-elf causes some of these ability scores to change."

-Dungeons & Dragons Players Handbook, v3.5

[Ragorn]

Yeah, there's a lot I left out, because I don't want to rewrite the Player's Handbook :) Alignment, equipment, calculating attack and damage bonuses, weapon proficiency, and just about everything concerning combat... there's a lot of information to digest all at once.

I used the rolling method of generating stats for a long time, and in the end, I just wasn't satisfied with it. When players bring rolled stats to the table, there's almost always someone who rolled lower than they would like, and there's often someone who rolled "suspiciously" well. Some classes require one or two very high stats (Wizard, Fighter), and other classes require four to six medium-high stats (Monk, Bard). If you want to play a Bard and your stats come out 17 16 13 12 10 9, you have to decide whether to play with sub-optimal stats or pick a different class.

Some DMs will let your reroll one or more times, or until you get a distribution you like. But I say, if you're going to allow rerolls, why not just let the player pick his own stats via point buy and save some trouble?

[Teshidee]

sweet idea, will look into it once i have more time at hands! thanks rags :)

personally never bothered with this system after the original - and cause it was in english! hehe

[Latreg]

I've updated Ragorn with some basic weapons and armor. You can see a list of basic weapons available here. If you're looking for stats on armor, this is the page you want to visit.

Ragorn carries a longsword and heavy wooden shield as his melee equipment. You can see how I've laid out the statistics for my weapons and armor based on the information in the charts I linked.

I should probably do a full writeup about equipment, if I have time later today I'll give a full explanation.

Nice post and nice work you put into it. Off topic, check out the weapons link and look at glaive, 2h just like I have always said 10' reach and you can't attack adjacent people ;) ah well poor bards.

[Cirath]

When players bring rolled stats to the table, there's almost always someone who rolled lower than they would like, and there's often someone who rolled "suspiciously" well.

That's why the DM should supervise the rolls. As for rolling lower than you'd like, well, like the song says: "You can't always get what you want."

Some DMs will let your reroll one or more times, or until you get a distribution you like. But I say, if you're going to allow rerolls, why not just let the player pick his own stats via point buy and save some trouble?

The problem with the point buy system, as I see it anyway, is that it produces the same three sorts of characters: one good stat and five mediocre ones, six slightly better than average stats, or two good stats and at least one or two "dump" stats. Rolling tends to give more variety, which I prefer. Either way, at least now both options are available.

Off topic, check out the weapons link and look at glaive, 2h just like I have always said 10' reach and you can't attack adjacent people ;) ah well poor bards.

You forget that seelie are faeries. They don't get taller than two and a half feet, so their glaive is about the size of a human longsword, at best.

[Gormal]

You forget that seelie are faeries. They don't get taller than two and a half feet, so their glaive is about the size of a human longsword, at best.

Didn't you know weapons grow/shrink with the wielder?!


An ogre wields an unseelie dagger.

[moritheil]

I have just this advice to give - do not make the mistake of thinking that 3.5 numbers are like 2.0 numbers. Go take a look at some powergaming forums if you intend to play 3.5.

The key to being good in 3.5 is specialization, up to a point*.

For example, if you want to play an AC tank, keep in mind that it's generally possible to get five times your level in AC (and more, but five times is plenty), thereby rendering yourself unhittable by "out of the box" monsters of your encounter level. Do not think that this equates to invicibility, as quite a few monsters will be able to do a number on you no matter what.

The main counterbalance to that is the fact that excessive specialization in one thing may render you useless overall. For example, it's possible to get around 60 AC at around 6th-7th level - but doing so guarantees that your damage will be pathetic, leaving you ignored by enemies and thus useless as a tank. Aiming for an AC of 5x level, or in this case, around 30, will render you nigh-unhittable by most enemies while allowing you to retain some hitting ability.


*My advice assumes the use of all splatbooks. Things are less crazy without them.

[Ragorn]

There's no way to achieve those power levels with just the Core rules, thankfully. My own play group uses a number of splatbooks, but for the purposes of introducing new players to the D&D engine via this thread, we don't really need to worry about 50+ AC and hundreds of damage ;)

I find that most classes can usually get to AC 17 with starting equipment (and Mage Armor for Wizards). If you're rolling up a character here, I find AC 16-17 to be a good target to shoot for.

The problem with the point buy system, as I see it anyway, is that it produces the same three sorts of characters: one good stat and five mediocre ones, six slightly better than average stats, or two good stats and at least one or two "dump" stats. Rolling tends to give more variety, which I prefer. Either way, at least now both options are available.

Yeah, I agree. You also almost never see odd-numbered stats with point buy, because it's more economical to stick with even numbers. But the three stat archetypes you described also come off the roller, but the roller can also give you "one 16 and a bunch of crap" and "four 18s." I use point buy these days because it starts everyone off on the same foot... I play with a high-power group of players (lots of min/maxing), and it's just easiest and fairest to let everyone start with the same stat pool.

The bottom line is, stats are the backbone of your character but high starting stats don't break the game. For people new to D&D, you can use the point buy system or the dice to determine your starting attributes, whichever you prefer. There are lots of systems... you can alter the number of stat points (22-30 is most common), and you can change the dice used to roll stats (3d6, 3d6 reroll 1s, 4d6 drop lowest, 18d6 mix-n-match, etc).

[moritheil]

The bottom line is, stats are the backbone of your character but high starting stats don't break the game.

This is true, despite what people might think. I DMed a 40-point buy campaign where the characters were ECL 14 demons, and a bunch of kobolds with mediocre stats managed to bring one down.

Incidentally, I should also point out that IME, being a fighter requires a bit more tactical savvy than being a caster. This is because a caster can swap spells rather painlessly, but a fighter is stuck with whatever feats he chose. The caster also generally has the option of just blasting away, whereas the fighter will need to do an assessment each fight to determine which of his options is likely to be of optimal use (trip/sunder/disarm? Charge? Grapple the enemy caster? Ready an action to hit?)

[Cirath]

This is true, despite what people might think. I DMed a 40-point buy campaign where the characters were ECL 14 demons, and a bunch of kobolds with mediocre stats managed to bring one down.

Never underestimate the power of kobolds.

You may want to be careful about giving the impression that the game always comes down to number crunching and power gaming. It can, but it doesnt have to. In the interest of educating newcommers to the system, it is probably best to just stick to understanding the basics in this thread, rather than how to build Pun-Pun.

[moritheil]

You may want to be careful about giving the impression that the game always comes down to number crunching and power gaming. It can, but it doesnt have to. In the interest of educating newcommers to the system, it is probably best to just stick to understanding the basics in this thread, rather than how to build Pun-Pun.

True. It doesn't boil down to just mechanics - it tends to be the RP between fights that is the most fun, IMHO. I stress mechanics early because I find that knowing the system well is essential to ensuring that your character comes across exactly as competent as he or she should be. :P

Btw, this thing is going up in a few days - we need a fourth!