Character Roles, PACKS-like character creation system Options

[Cabral]

The archetypes thread that's running right now got me thinking, are there some baseline concepts that we can flesh out some basics to use as the first stage in character creation that would really help out new players create their own characters? I was thinking something like:

1. Pick race (Human, dwarf, elf, leprechaun, etc)
2. Pick theme (Gear, Magic, other?)
3. Pick focus (Fire support, melee, magic, social, etc)
4. Optional: pick secondary focus (with each focus listing a strong, average, and weak synergies with the primary focus)
5. Apply PACKS (Official, Derie, or other)
6. Customize (add and remove skill points, items, qualities, etc.

For the foci, I was thinking that the Runner's Companion was a good place to start. Each one would result with some "minimum stats," recommended skills, and maybe items too.
For example, a gear oriented fire support would maybe give a 2 charisma, a 4 agility, and threes in everything else. Skills might be a firearms skill group of 4, but that might dissuade someone from focusing on automatics. That could be a secondary choice, though; do you excel with one type of weapon or are you a generalist? From there, gear might include smartlink, smartlinked weapons, armored clothes, ammo, etc.

The idea is to take a new or newish player, take them through character creation and wind up with a character that is theirs without scaring them off (Ah! Too many options!) and not leaving any fundamental gaps in the final character (Uhm, you have 5 guns, but where's the ammo?)

[FuelDrop]

The archetypes thread that's running right now got me thinking, are there some baseline concepts that we can flesh out some basics to use as the first stage in character creation that would really help out new players create their own characters? I was thinking something like:

1. Pick race (Human, dwarf, elf, leprechaun, etc)
2. Pick theme (Gear, Magic, other?)
3. Pick focus (Fire support, melee, magic, social, etc)
4. Optional: pick secondary focus (with each focus listing a strong, average, and weak synergies with the primary focus)
5. Apply PACKS (Official, Derie, or other)
6. Customize (add and remove skill points, items, qualities, etc.

For the foci, I was thinking that the Runner's Companion was a good place to start. Each one would result with some "minimum stats," recommended skills, and maybe items too.
For example, a gear oriented fire support would maybe give a 2 charisma, a 4 agility, and threes in everything else. Skills might be a firearms skill group of 4, but that might dissuade someone from focusing on automatics. That could be a secondary choice, though; do you excel with one type of weapon or are you a generalist? From there, gear might include smartlink, smartlinked weapons, armored clothes, ammo, etc.

The idea is to take a new or newish player, take them through character creation and wind up with a character that is theirs without scaring them off (Ah! Too many options!) and not leaving any fundamental gaps in the final character (Uhm, you have 5 guns, but where's the ammo?)

Maybe some variant on the Priority Chargen System?

[Cabral]

I want to keep BP or Karmagen as the underlying system. I've never liked the priority system, so that may be personal preference. I have considered presenting the Priority system for people who work best with "pick 25 skill points, go!" In general, though, I want to avoid it.

[Iduno]

It sounds pretty reasonable, although you might want to put off picking race until after (or while) determining the character type. Maybe as late as right before or after applying PACKS, if a particular race isn't important to the character concept.

[Bearclaw]

I usually try to get new players to use a character from the book, plus some karma/cash. They always end up not liking their first character anyway, so why not just use a disposable guy til they figure out what they really want to do. Otherwise the other players will "help" them, and they end up with a min-maxed nightmare.