Character Advice

Google Doc Character Creation Worksheet, if your logged in to Google you can go to File > Make a copy

there is a link to a Google doc creation worksheet.

So you missed a few things, no worries, it might make it a bit easier on yah, im just gonna go in order of things i noticed:

you get another spell out of the wards tradition, you get 3 at tier one, I would recomend Inertial Shield from CoH (Codex of Heroes book) it will help with your Avoidance issues.

You also might want to note the spells you get from Prestidigitation, , there is a Divine only spell from CoH thats kinda nice called “Blessings of the Faithful”

I can see why you did what you did with you stats, However I might recommend:
Attribute Points Score Bumps
Might 6 5
Prowess 9 7 1 (Human)
Quickness 1 3
Vigor 3 4
Charisma 9 7 1 (initiate)
Insight 3 4
Logic 6 5
Resolve 3 4
40
that might get you a bit more bang at the outset, PR is really super important (and again that bumps your avoidance)

Your talents, I think you should have Weapon master Gladius for getting weapon training from Divine Archtype and from your background (that might be in the FAQ)

You might consider swapping out some of your talents to things that benefit your Core idea better, it sounds like your core idea is Melee Fighter & Divine caster of Illir (BTW YAY Illir!)
Huge ( from CoH) would give you a bump to might, Learn Martial Technique , for sweeping strike (if you qualify) or something else might be good for you.
Adaptation: Delay Strain might be key talent for you also.

There is a pretty cool path named “Brethren of the Order of st. Theomund the Missionary” (in CoH) you might want to check out and aim for if you don’t already have your path choices picked out.

I’m not sure on your skills, you might be unhappy when it comes time to advance your character along the divine archtype because you don’t have many “social skills” and you are missing out on an advancement option because of that. I’d be really interested in seeing where all of your points and selections came from.

you get another spell out of the wards tradition, you get 3 at tier one, I would recomend Inertial Shield from CoH (Codex of Heroes book) it will help with your Avoidance issues.

He has 2 Benediction Spells currently (Benediction and Eye), so he’d have to drop one to make his Primary Tradition Wards.

Prestidigitation is basically the Talent that gives “The Universal Spells” for a caster, and includes Unravel the Thread (dispel magic) and Discern Residue (detect magic) and a few other utility spells.

I can see why you did what you did with you stats, However I might recommend:
Attribute Points Score Bumps
Might 6 5
Prowess 9 7 1 (Human)
Quickness 1 3
Vigor 3 4
Charisma 9 7 1 (initiate)
Insight 3 4
Logic 6 5
Resolve 3 4
40
that might get you a bit more bang at the outset, PR is really super important (and again that bumps your avoidance)

The +1 from Initiate has to go in the lowest of the pair (Charisma and Logic) and if Charisma is higher, it has to go to Logic.

OMG Not another Delbert!! One is enough Though some of us already Speak Delbert so that’s good

hahaha, im not sure copying my style of roleplying is needed to play the character, but it is infectious, I tend to corrupt people

You’re Hurrian though so there’s going to be some skill, weapon, and shield differences too. Whew! We dodged that bullet

John

I know John (Harliquinn) and Josh (SamhainIA) have covered this fairly well, but having taught quite a few people to build characters I also know that sometimes even the fairly detailed procedure that they have already used can be confusing, so. . .

Step 1: Envision your character!

From what you’ve said, you want to play a Human Coryani Illiirite Battle Priest who focuses more on the protection aspect rather than offence. You want to be a healer, protector, but also one who can swing swords while he burns away strain.

Step 2: Choose your archetype

You have chosen the Divine Archetype, which grants you immediate access to Divine Spell Casting, the most common form of magical healing. Furthermore, you have already chosen your patron deity as Illiir, which specifies what you get in this archetype:

Skills: Arcanum (Cants), Knowledge (Religion), your Deities chosen Skill (for Illiir, this is Mettle), and any one Combat Skill and one Social Skill
Talents: Armour Proficiency (Any armour with the name “Lorica” in it), Weapon Training (Gladius), Divine Spell Casting, Prestidigitation.

Step 3: Determining your attribute scores

If you want to be a Battle Priest, you are going to have to focus on a few things. Prowess is needed for any weapon attack rolls or spell attack rolls that does not require targeting a Discipline Defence, so you want to get that high. Your Gladius uses Might for its damage, so that is also one you want to keep an eye out for. Quickness and Vigour are both good, but you can probably afford to be a bit skimpier here, but you still want to get them as high as possible.

When it comes to the ‘mental skills’, Charisma is where you want to be! Insight is also useful for Avoidance, but for you Resolve and Logic are probably going to be stats that you can keep pretty low. As such, I’d recommend the following:

Stat – Score/d#/Passive
Mi – 5/d8/3
Pr – 6/d8/3
Qu – 5/d8/3
Vi – 4/d8/2

Ch – 6/d8/3
In – 4/d8/2
Lo – 3/d6/2
Re – 4/d8/2

This gives you a fairly balanced set of scores, allowing you maximum utility.

Step 4: Determine your Hero’s Race

Well, this one is easy as you already decided to play a Human. As a Human, you gain the following traits:

Attribute: +1 to Any attribute of your choice (I’d personally go Prowess).
Skills: Select any 2 Skill from any two different categories (ie: Combat, Social, Lore)
Talents: You gain two additional talents
Other: You are trained in your native language, and you gain a +1 to any defence of your choice. I’d personally choose Avoidance.

With this information, you have the following things:

Skills: Arcanum (Cants), Knowledge (Religion), your Deities chosen Skill (for Illiir, this is Mettle), and any one Combat Skill and one Social Skill. Additionally, any 2 skills from different categories of skills.
Talents: Armour Proficiency (Any armour with the name “Lorica” in it), Weapon Training (Gladius), Divine Spell Casting, Prestidigitation, TALENT FROM HUMAN, TALENT FROM HUMAN.

Step 5: Choose your Home Nation.

Again, this was chosen (by my read) as being the Coryani Empire. As such, you may select 2 of the following skills to add to your list:

Appraise, Artisan (Blacksmithing), Deceit, Etiquette, Tracking, Wilderness Lore.

Of these, for what you are looking at, Wilderness Lore (as you are a traveler) and Etiquette (as you are a priest and therefore a ‘learned class’) would personally be my choices.

Additionally, you learn your Native Language is Low Coryani, and you are considered to be literate in that language.

Step 6: Choose your Background Profession.

So, you want to be a Priest? Well welcome to the club! You have chosen “Initiate of the Gods (Illiir). With this Background, you gain the following things:

Attributes: Your Logic (being the lowest between Lo and Ch) gains a +1.
SKills: You gain another rank in Arcanum (Cants), another in Knowledge (Religion) and any one Combat Skill.
Talents: You gain Weapon Training (Gladius) again, which will upgrade your Weapon Training to Weapon Mastery T.1.
Gear and money: You will gain a suit of Lorica armour, a gladius, a common (wooden) holy symbol of Illiir (or a Mother Church rubrick), a Prayer Book, and a Traveller’s Kit, as well as 3d6+Charisma die in Silver coins.

If you take my advice from Race, You will now have the following traits:

Stat – Score/d#/Passive
Mi – 5/d8/3
Pr – 7/d10/3 (from Human race)
Qu – 5/d8/3
Vi – 4/d8/2

Ch – 6/d8/3
In – 4/d8/2
Lo – 4/d8/2 (from Background)
Re – 4/d8/2

Skills: Arcanum (Cants)x2, Knowledge (Religion)x2, Mettle, and any one Combat Skill (x2) and one Social Skill. Additionally, any 2 skills from different categories of skills. Additionally, you’d have Etiquette and Wilderness Lore (again, if you take my advice).
Talents: Armour Proficiency (Any armour with the name “Lorica” in it), Weapon Training (Gladius), Divine Spell Casting, Prestidigitation, Weapon Mastery (Gladius), TALENT FROM HUMAN, TALENT FROM HUMAN.

Step 7: Train your Heroes Skills

Okay, as it stands, you have the following Skills:

Arcanum (Cants)x2, Knowledge (Religion)x2, Mettle, Etiquette, Wilderness Lore, and any one Combat Skill (x2) and one Social Skill. Additionally, any 2 skills from different categories of skills.

First, let’s decide what to do with the skills you haven’t chosen yet. Personally, I’d put the Combat Skills into Melee (Balanced) for your sword, and your one Social Skill into Persuasion because being persuasive is ALWAYS a good thing. You now have the ability to put 2 skills in 2 categories, so I’d put those into your Melee (Balanced) and Arcanum (Cants) as those are your primary ‘offensive’ skills. To that end you have:

Arcanum (Cants) +3
Melee (Balanced) +3
Mettle +1
Knowledge (Religion) +1
Wilderness Lore +1
Persuasion +1
Etiquette +1

You now gain an additional number of Skill points = 3+Passive Re+Passive Lo = 7. You cannot boost anything above +4 in this stage, and unless you REALLY need a skill it is a waste to buy 2 pts at a time (as they cost 3 ranks to raise 2, but you can train at +1 for one of these 7 points). Personally, I’d look into training Acrobatics (you chose this one on your sheet for the talent), Battle (for leadership), Empathy, and Perception as they are all VERY useful skills at +1 each, and spend the remaining three on Arcanum, Melee, and Persuasion. This would give you:

Arcanum (Cants) +4
Melee (Balanced) +4
Battle +1
Mettle +1
Knowledge (Religion) +1
Wilderness Lore +1
Persuasion +2
Etiquette +1
Perception +1
Acrobatics+1
Empathy +1

Step 8: Choose a Flaw

You’ve already chosen Flaw: Phobia (Spirits) to gain the additional talent, which means you now have the following talents:

Talents: Armour Proficiency (Any armour with the name “Lorica” in it), Weapon Training (Gladius), Divine Spell Casting, Prestidigitation, Weapon Mastery (Gladius), TALENT FROM HUMAN, TALENT FROM HUMAN, TALENT FROM FLAW.

Step 9: Choose your Talents

So, in addition to the talents just listed, you gain TWO MORE talents at this step. To that end, you have a whopping FIVE more talents that you can choose!!!

1) Acrobatics (from what you’ve already chosen)
2) Leadership
3) Heirloom (Exceptional Lorica Segmentata)
4) Spell Focus (Diminish Fatigue)
5) [[Insert another choice here]]

I know you wanted Born Leader, but personally I’d wait to get that until later.

Spells:

Well, you’ve already chosen Benedictions as your Primary (may I suggest Castigate as your 3rd Primary tradition spell as you gain 3 and have only chosen 2). I do like the Illiirite and Deity spells though, but ultimately the traditions you choose is up to you.

Conclusions:

With this build, we will have gotten you Basic Defences of Avoidance/Fortitude/Discipline of 19/17/17, which is modified to 18/17/17 with the 1 Bulk from the Exceptional Armour.

Make sense?

EDITED:
Just to be clear, you can only train a new skill two ranks in step 7. You can only add a single rank to an already trained skill (to a max of 4).

Nope.

You may spend a single point
to advance any trained skill, you may also acquire a new
trained skill at 1 Rank for a single point, or opt to acquire
a newly trained skill at 2 ranks for 3 points.

Question. The character creation sheet I have says at step 3, Heroic–40 Point Buy. I would have taken this to mean your points add up to 40 at the end of this step, but both on Cody’ setup and my sheet, they add up to 37ish. How does this part work?

Alright, I think I have a halfway decent handle on things. I had chosen Castiate as a speel, it just never made it onto the character sheet. My oversight. I ended up with nothing on the list that Cody gave (Appraise, Artisan: Blacksmith, Deceit, Etiquette, Tracking, Wilderness Lore). That will have to be examined further. I think I will take heirloom for the Lorica. I am thinking of losing acrobatics as skill and talent. Partially, I want to get perception, partially, I really just haven’t used ityet. Weapon mastery needs added. I will need to pick out at least one talent, two if I drop Acrobatics, if I understand right. I need to add the “universal spells” such as Discern residue. Restatting should be examined. I do believe I have abetter understanding of the character creation process at his point. I have messaged my area Harvester to ask if he will help me make final adjustments using the advice I have gotten here. Will still need to examine Paths and that is something I feel well need to be done in person as there are juist to many options. Thank everyone who has posted on this thread. I appreciate it guys! You’ve all been awesome and a great help. I will keep watching this thread in case anyone else has anything to add to it. Hope I can make it to Winter Fantasy and meeta couple of you.

Alex Parmelee
Fort Wanye