Character Creation
Your character is a persona you take on as you play the game. This is the protagonist that will be making decisions and affecting the world around you. To begin making a character, print out a character sheet using the link below and follow along with this chapter. Or, you can make an account and use our online character management tool!
Joining a Guild
To kick off character creation, you're going to join a guild to join. This should be done as a group, as the guild you join will determine the type of adventures you will go on and the type of character you're inspired to create.
There are five common guilds, each will train your character in a specific set of skills. The idea behind joining a guild during character creation is that it allows the players to understand the mechanics of their party from the very beginning. All the players being in the same guild inherently means that they are all on the same job together and at the very least have a "coworker" relationship.
It is entirely acceptable for players to be part of a variety of guilds, but it's generally recommended that all players be of the same guild. Being part of the same guild generally means that players are working together on a guild job and easily bypasses the awkward "we meet in a tavern" scene that is a common trope in role play games. Being part of separate guilds means you're on a job that needs multiple disciplines and the connection between players might be more tenuous. The guilds help establish some very basic character relationships right from the beginning.
Each guild has a list of starting skills. Beneath each skill in the skills box on your character sheet is a row of bubbles that marks how much of that skill your character has. The more bubbles you have filled in, the better you will be when you try to do something related to that task (see the Skills chapter for details).
Once a guild has been chosen, all players will increase the skills listed by that guild by one. Congratulations! You're now employed.
Assassins Guild
Assassins are those that believe anyone is worthy of death… for the right price. Assassins lurk in the dark and strike when least expected. They are efficient killers and know how to get in, spill blood, and get out as quickly as possible.
| Guild Skills |
|---|
| Investigate |
| Sneaky |
| Social |
| Throwdown |
Starborne Hunters Guild
Starborne Hunters are those that thrill in hunting the most dangerous beasts of the wilds. Their main goal is to kill Starborne creatures, harvest Star Gems from them, and bring the crystals back to the guild. Occasionally, they will get hired to kill Starborne creatures that are causing a nuisance, or to help defend smaller towns from Starborne creature attacks.
| Guild Skills |
|---|
| Investigate |
| Medic |
| Nature |
| Throwdown |
Explorers Guild
Explorers desire to bring the unknown world into the light and to solve the mysteries of the world. They go beyond the borders of the map to discover lands that no one has ever experienced and they know that the answers to the worlds greatest questions can be found, if you can only look in the right spot.
| Guild Skills |
|---|
| Craft |
| Investigate |
| Medic |
| Throwdown |
Mercenaries Guild
Mercenaries are those who use their strength to make a profit. They are loyal defenders – if they get paid. They are masters of martial skills and make formidable opponents.
| Guild Skills |
|---|
| Craft |
| Investigate |
| Medic |
| Throwdown |
Thieves Guild
Thieves understand the concept of value. They know that a fortune can only be made when working outside the law. Nothing is beyond their grasp and no place is prohibited to them – if they can be sneaky enough.
| Guild Skills |
|---|
| Investigate |
| Performance |
| Sneaky |
| Throwdown |
Your Character
Next, we need to define the most basic attributes of who your character is. At the top-right of your character sheet are 4 fields: name, race, physique, and demeanor.
Name is your character's name and it is how you will be referred to during the game. It can be anything, but make sure it sounds epic. Like Bob. Bob is always a great name for a character.
Species is your character's Species. In this game, there are six unique races for you to choose from: Locess, Mausca, Isser, Matari, Slated, and Ungal. A list of these races with descriptions and their starting stats is further down.
Demeanor is how your character presents their self in most situations. Write in an adjective like cocky, excitable, confident, etc. This adjective is a tool to help you act as your character would.
Physique is how your character is built physically. Write in an adjective like fat, thin, lean, strong, etc. This adjective is a tool to help guide what other characters in the world would see at a glance.
By combining these four fields, you can create a brief description of your character. For example: A fat, jovial Mausca named Bob.
The Species
Selecting a species will determine the stats that your character starts with. Your stats are five terms located at the top-right of your character sheet: Nimble, Tough, Competence, Constitution, and Spirit.
Nimble defines your character's agility. Nimble is used to move quickly, jump over objects, dodge, and for any other actions that require an amount of finesse.
Tough defines your character's physical strength. Tough is used to lift and move heavy objects, wrestle other creatures, and for any other actions that require an amount of strength.
Competence defines your character's ability to act under pressure, read situations, and see things that other people wouldn't. It will be used in moments of pressure and crisis.
Constitution defines your ability to endure stress. It us used to fend off poisons, resist disease and addiction, to exert yourself for extended periods of time, and for any other actions that require resistance or endurance.
Spirit defines how strong and willful your character's soul is. Spirit is used to activate magical runes and to deflect incoming spells.
Beside each term is a row of bubbles that mark how much of that stat your character has. The more bubbles you have filled in, the better you will be when you try to do something related to that task (see the Skills chapter for details).
When you pick a species, you are given a modifier next to each stat. Fill in the corresponding bubbles on your character sheet to match the modifiers given.
Locess
The Locess (lo-KESS) are bug-like creatures that stand about 6 feet tall. They come from the World Forest, a forest of trees that are as large as mountains. The most prominent features of the Locess are their exoskeleton and extra arms. Their exoskeleton comes in a variety of vibrant greens, light browns, and de-saturated reds. Their exoskeleton is also tough and covers every inch of their body, making it difficult to discern emotions in their face. Their heads are very lizard-like, with wide, square jaws that comes to a point at the chin. The overall shape of the head is wide, with their eyes set far apart. Their eyes are very large, usually a dark, neutral color, and are multifaceted. They feature 4 arms and pseudo-wings that hang from their backs. These wings are non-functional and mostly give the impression of a cape and are usually a dusty-gray color.
| Stats |
|---|
| +2 Nimble |
| -1 Tough |
| +0 Competence |
| +1 Constitution |
| -1 Spirit |
Mausca
The Mausca (mah-SKAH) are small people, usually no taller than 3 to 4 feet, with slight frames. They hail from the southern swamps and their physical features mirror that landscape. Their hair is incredibly thick and course with a deep, dark green color and usually grown long, giving their hair the appearance of swamp vines that hang from the trees. Their skin is generally a dark shade of cool brown and they have deep creases all along their body that makes them appear as though they are made from wood. Their most baffling feature is their eyes. Looking as though they were cut from pearls, their eyes are small and shimmer with a milky-white color and an opalescent sheen.
| Stats |
|---|
| +2 Nimble |
| -1 Tough |
| +0 Competence |
| +1 Constitution |
| -1 Spirit |
Isser
The Isser originated in the frozen tundras of the north and are large, burly people that generally stand about 6 to 7 feet tall with thick white fur and large, owl-lke eyes. They have small boney protrusions on their jaw and brow. Their ears are long, pointed, and seated higher on their heads than the other species. Most adult Isser wear a shawl embroidered with images that tell stories of the individuals victories hunting great beasts or telling histories of the family and tribe they come from.
| Stats |
|---|
| +0 Nimble |
| +2 Tough |
| +0 Competence |
| +0 Constitution |
| -1 Spirit |
Matari
The Matari (mah-TAR-ee) come from a massive cliff overlooking an ocean where they have a city carved into the cliff wall. Their culture is a Matriarchy that celebrates childhood, giving their young a dedicated period of time to leave home and explore the world to choose what social role they grow into. Matari communities are generally very close-knit. They are the tallest of the species, standing anywhere from 6 to 8 feet tall, and have very blunt and broad features. Their skin is a marbling of crimson and tan-brown with no hair at all.
| Stats |
|---|
| -1 Nimble |
| +1 Tough |
| +1 Competence |
| +0 Constitution |
| -1 Spirit |
Slated
The Slated (SLAY-ted) are creatures of the endless desert, and their bodies are adapted to that harsh environment. Standing no more than 6 feet tall, they have thick scales with a dull-gray color that cover their entire body. Along their back and on top of their head is a rounded shell. When crouching the down, the shell locks into a sphere shape that can keep sand out from impending sandstorms and is very durable against predators. Their eyes have two lids: a thin one for keeping out sand and a thick one for closing their eyes to light. Their culture is centered around invention and engineering. They celebrate failure and push the boundaries of what people think is possible.
| Stats |
|---|
| -1 Nimble |
| +0 Tough |
| +2 Competence |
| +1 Constitution |
| -1 Spirit |
Ungal
The Ungal (OON-gaul) are the most mysterious species. They come from deep within the World Forest, where light does not touch the forest floor. They stand no taller than 5 feet and are the least humanoid of the species. Their lower body is like the cap of an oyster mushroom flipped upside-down, the lip of which flows and ungulates to give them mobility. Their arms do not end in hands. Instead, they end in a tubular appendage that functions much like an elephants trunk to grab and manipulate objects. Their head has no face. Instead, they have a few optical stalks that grow around their entire head, giving a 360 degree field of view that registers mostly heat and also some light. On the top of their head grows a crown of small oyster-mushroom-like growths, which are used as both a symbol of age and wisdom as well as sensory organs to pick up sounds within both the normal and infrasonic rages. And along their entire body are small, plate-like growths that are constantly in motion, and the underside of these plates glows with a phosphorescence.
| Stats |
|---|
| +0 Nimble |
| -1 Tough |
| +1 Competence |
| +2 Constitution |
| -1 Spirit |
Filling in the Gaps
The next step is to round out your character with flavor text. All characters need a past that defines them. On the back of the character sheet are four large boxes labeled Goals & Motives, Personal Morals, Flaws & Weaknesses, and Important Connections.
These four boxes help define who your character really is, the relationships that define their past, and they inform how your character makes decision and. In each box, jot down one or two brief sentences to add some depth to your character. If you can't think of anything right away, that's okay. You can slowly fill these out during play. As situations arise, try to decide why your character would do what you want them to do. Then see if that reason would fall under one of these four categories. If it does, then jot down a quick note so you remember in the future.
Try to keep these somewhat general. Trying to be too specific can make it much harder to find things to put here. Working on this with your fellow players is highly encouraged! Bounce ideas off of each other, use each other's characters as plot points, and see if you can forge a connected story.
Goals & Motives are what drive your character. Perhaps they want to be the greatest thief that ever lived, or perhaps their family is motivating them to take on any job just to provide for them. Perhaps they're seeking revenge on someone and it's all they can think about, or they want to open up a small business and settle down, but need to take on jobs until their life is in a spot that allows that. The world is your oyster here and anything you think of can work.
Personal Morals are your character's personal code of ethics. Perhaps they are completely against all violence, or maybe they think that there's a certain amount of moral grey era and getting the job done is ultimately what matters. Maybe their okay with stealing, or maybe they're very rigid about following the law.
Flaws & Weaknesses are the things that your character struggles with. Perhaps they're terrified of fire. Perhaps they will always do what an attractive person wants them to do, or maybe they're easily distracted. These can be as serious or non-serious as you want. It's all about just adding a little bit of detail that will be fun to play off of in the game.
Important Connections are connections from your past. These can be tutors, trainers, parents, professors, criminal contacts, and other important connections your character could have made in their past. This is primarily useful for the Game Master so that they can tie connections from the past into the game, but it's also a great way to create a shared backstory with your fellow player. Perhaps you've done a job together before, but it ended catastrophe. Maybe you're old friends and have done jobs on and off together for years.
Once you've gotten some things put in each box, consider writing out a full backstory, if you're feeling ambitious or inspired. This is where you describe their life and what they've gone through up to the point when the game starts. It's entirely optional and it's where you can give specific reasons for what you put in those four boxes.
Starting Skills
From here, you need to give your character some additional skills. This is after filling in some character details because picking your starting skills can be overwhelming. Lean on what you've written out for your characters details to choose skills that feel like they just fit your character. Or, you can do the inverse if you're struggling to find things to put in your details! Pick out your starting skills and use that to inform who your character is.
You get four skill bubbles to fill in. That means that you may increase your skills 4 times. You can increase 4 skills once, you can condense them into just a couple skills, or any combination of that kind, as long as you only increase your skills 4 times. However, you cannot increase any skill past +2 during character creation.
Each bubble represents your level of skill for that particular skill. All skills start at -1, meaning your character has no experience with that skill. You're guild will increase a few sills to +0. And now you essentially have four skill points to distribute however you'd like. For details on what skill do and how they're used, see the Skills Chapter.
Do not start with the Stardew skill before reading through the Stardew chapter
Wealth and Luck
As a final step, you need to decide how wealthy your character is and how lucky they are. Wealth describes how wealthy your character is on average and is a general descriptive term. In Guildsmen, you will not be keeping track of your specific amount of currency. Instead, your character gets a wealth adjective that describes their overall ability to by goods and services. If you wrote in some character details or a backstory, go with whatever makes the most sense for what you wrote. Otherwise, it's generally suggested to with Moderate
Pick an adjective and fill in the corresponding bubble in the Wealth box.
| Wealth Adjectives |
|---|
| Destitute |
| Poor |
| Moderate |
| Wealthy |
| Exquisite |
While you're on your adventure, you may end up buying more things than your wealth can sustain. When this happens, your Wealth may go down to a lower adjective. More details on this can be found in The Market Chapter.
Once you've determined what your wealth is, you'll need to determine how lucky your character is. Roll 1d6 (1, 6-sided die) and consult the table below. Fill in the corresponding bubble in the Luck box on your character sheet.
Whenever you do something or want something to happen that would rely on luck, you will roll 2d6 (2, 6-sided dice) and add the number that is in your luck box. The higher the total number, the better the outcome. This same principle is how skills work (see the Skills chapter for details).
| Luck | |
|---|---|
| 1 | -3 |
| 2 | -2 |
| 3 | -1 |
| 4 | +1 |
| 5 | +2 |
| 6 | +3 |
Going Forward
Now that you have a character, give your character whatever items make sense for them to have due to your skills, background, and guild. These are items you should just write in. The Market chapter outlines a few items that are special to this world or require special rules to use. Feel free to use this list to add items to your character and also feel free to write in whatever items you can think of that would make narrative sense for your character. The Game Master may veto any items if they wish. Next, go on to the next chapter to learn about skills, what they are, what they can do, and how to increase them.
We suggest you read all of the rule chapters in their entirety to get a good grasp of the game and its mechanics. It's not necessary but it will teach you what's possible with the systems of this game.
There's so much you can do with the mechanics we've created for you, and we think you'll really enjoy using them. And if you don't care about the mechanics but want some good world lore to read, go through the Lore section and the Bestiary. Everything here is a work in progress and feedback is always welcome! Message @ellebell43 on the discord or send me message at hello@guildsmenrpg.com
As you move forward through the game, we hope that you find a love for role play and enjoy the systems of the game as much as we do.
Good luck!