A few old tips

[Mort]

This was written a long time ago, but I thought it was simple and a good advice, so I'd share with you. This is in regard as to the pathway your character should aspire.

 

-Establish a network of allies, companions, contacts, followers, and a patron. An ally is someone who is an approximate peer (such as former and current P.C.s) who can aid you in specific tasks. A companion can be a significant other, an animal, or family members who are financially or emotionally dependent on your character(s).
 
 Contacts are N.P.C.s who are specific to a certain location and who can provide information and help with the purchase and sale of goods. Followers are N.P.C.s who follow your character's commands. A patron is someone of higher social station who serves as a mentor to your P.C., giving training, favors and material support, and orders.
 
 -Lead a team (such as an away mission from your privateer carrack) and demonstrate improvement in teamwork. This is often the most challenging criterion.
 
 -Join an organization. This is to prove that your P.C. is developing and becoming more integrated into my fantasy setting. Although Lawful characters such as Paladins will have an easier time finding something to join or start, even Chaotic ones such as Rogues and Bards can find a loosely affiliated thieves' guild or a Bardic college.
 
 -Gain renown in your chosen field. As your P.C.s reach mid- to high levels, they should become known to others in their occupational classes as well as to the general public. Fame (or infamy) is a mixed blessing, but one that most experienced adventurers acquire.
 
 -Use signature items. The figures of fiction, legend, and myth are remembered for certain weapons, wondrous items, and tools, not everything they were carrying. Certain skills, feats, and spells may also qualify.

My second advice would be regarding character creation:

Now, let's do a bit of character analysis. My first bit of advice would be to start with a general theme when coming up with a PC. Pick a thematic and go along with it, don't try to mix everything. Some themes mix well, others not so much.

For example,

The monstrous gnoll cook / fighter with his handy butcher's cleavers in hand. It's simple, you can build a colorful personae around it. You can design a few recipes to add flavor. In-game, you can speak about how this creature taste that way, that creature taste like this. Etc. It is an appealing concept that looks simple and that you can very creative with.

A common mistake would be to add another facet to The gnoll cook such as: is also an engineer. It loses all its charisma as it becomes 'gimmicky', while the other seemed amusing and interesting.

The next step would be, how do we make this character into a realistic concept. Characters need to look real. They should care about their life, what to do with, and it doesn't look like they are playing a video-game. So let's return to our life,

Our gnoll cook. Why did he focus on cooking? He's weak physically, in comparison to other gnolls, and the only way he could survive in a tribe that embraces the survival of the fittest mentality was to work on his other qualities ... he is witty, and dextrous enough to cook excellent meals for the chief out of human flesh. So he did so until he won the respect and trust of his peers, he then offered his service to poison enemies of the chief in order to get rid of them, so his influence through the tribe slowly grew ... Then, a conflict over a potential mate led him to poison the chief, he fled the tribe with this potential mate but she was slaughtered by a group of adventurers :-( . Enter EFU:A .

Alright, not bad. So how do we build this character. What class fits the most for him?

 - Bard? His cooking could be a form of Art.
 - Ranger? All gnolls are hunters, he simply specialize more in cooking.
 - Barbarian? Well, he is a barbaric tribal.
 - A Combination of the above.

Once that's decided, you can easily justified taking FE: Whatever, as in it is the specialty that he cooks. And build him with a few flavor feats and a few mechanical feats. We will take handaxes as weapon, since they ressemble butcher's cleavers.

Then, you can add extra meat to the character.

Hope that helps. Some people asks for what I consider to be "No no" of character builds:

 - Having a specialization in one school, but only taking Spell focuses of another school.
 - Barb / Fighter / Ranger ... Too many themes into a single character.
 - Barb / Fighter / Rogue ... see above.
 - 1 Monk / Other class X ... unappealing, try to keep the multiclasses level close to each others if possible.
 - Druid/Monk & Barbarian/Fighter.
 - High Int Wizards who spend their skillpoints on Lockpick / Disable Trap to be more proficient questers. Again, if your wizard is a slick thief guild illusionist and it makes sense, great. But, dont try to mix too many talents into a single character!

These are the ones that stand out in my mind at the moment.

[Howlando]

Good stuff.

Another hot tip, stop leaving your deity field blank!

It doesn't need to be an exact deity, but something descriptive is definitely appreciated. For example, just "Polytheistic" if there's no specific deity.

[Black_TopHat]

I like the very last sentence in the end there
 
"add extra meat to your character"
 
A Pun?
 
*edited*

[9lives]

No, a pun.

[Egon the Monkey]

High Int Wizards who spend their skillpoints on Lockpick / Disable Trap  to be more proficient questers.

Wizards can get a lot of skillpoints, and it's nice to have something you can do when you are out of spells. It's tough to raise your AB enough to support as a flank attacker (but it can be done, and is fun). It is considerably easier to take a couple of support skills. With only 4 class skills and 5-6 skillpoints or more a level, you will end up rounding out the PC with cross-class. Either into social skills, detection, combat skills like Disc or Tumble... or break-in skills. Well, or H/MS if you're a halfling. So, what *is* good to cross-class into?

Mind you, I'm speaking from almost the opposite end of things. I enjoy playing PCs that have surprising or numerous talents that distinguish them from what you expect from guessing their class or race. Archetypes are popular for a reason. It's simple to make a good character that fits them, to guide the concept with influences of great examples from fiction, and so on. However, it's fun breaking them and seeing how far you can get with that. It's definitely easiest to pick one or two overarching reasons to go outside the box, not lots of little quirks. The contrast helps the differences stand out. For example Anderson's a scholar and a gentleman, but he still demonstrates a typically half-orc capacity for shouty violence with unsubtle weaponry.

[Howlando]

I can't speak for Mort, but the sort of generic "quest wizard" who doesn't really have a distinguishing flair is just not that interesting. It's nice to see wizards that have a particular flair or specialization.

[Drakill Tannan]

I suppose it depends on what kind of wizard you are doing. An archeologist picking locks and disarming traps? I can't see anything wrong with that: he has to to get acces to old ruins and gather obscure arcane knowledge. Same would be the case of a wizard who was a spy, or a thief or something. However a militant evoker picking locks doesn't make much sence. It is logical to think he'd be able to spot (although not to disarm) traps in the battlefield, nor does a heartless necromancer. However heartless necromancers could cross class in persuade, bluff and intimidate etc etc etc

Just my 2 cents

[TheImpossibleDream]

Theres a class for archeology.

[ExileStrife]

It is very easy for the DM team to tell the difference between a character who has dumped points into skills like disable trap and lock picking for optimal questing efficiency, and one who is doing it for flair and added character.

It is also very easy to distinguish active, creative portrayals of this flair representing time and thought put into the character, rather than after-the-fact justifications to get you out of a tight spot if we ask why your character behaved in a certain way or has a certain ability.

[Cluckyx]

It is very easy for the DM team to tell the difference between a character who has dumped points into skills like disable trap and lock picking for optimal questing efficiency, and one who is doing it for flair and added character.

It is also very easy to distinguish active, creative portrayals of this flair representing time and thought put into the character, rather than after-the-fact justifications to get you out of a tight spot if we ask why your character behaved in a certain way or has a certain ability.

This. A thousand times this. And guess which one we're going to find more interesting.

[Equinox]

Theres a class for archeology.

Wrong.

PrC doesn't work.

[TheImpossibleDream]

Wrong.

PrC doesn't work.

Rogue is not a PrC.

[Ebok]

Why is Rogue the archeologist? Everything that lives in the ruins is immune to them >_>

[TheImpossibleDream]

Why is Rogue the archeologist? Everything that lives in the ruins is immune to them >_>

Ruins are filled with traps, locks and hidden doors that a wizard or in fact any class without all of those skills would never be able to bypass. In addition magical items found in such places are often specific to the race that made them. Meaning you'd need use magic device in order to bypass thier racial requirement (elven ruins for example). But yeah this is getting derailed quite a bit now.

[The Old Hack]

If I may suggest, could some of this thread possibly be worked into an article or post with advice to newcomers to EfU who may not have any idea of what is considered good form here and what isn't? I know I could have benefited from something like that when I arrived. I unwittingly violated several don'ts with my first characters partly through ignorance and partly through bad habits from elsewhere. A Neutral wizard with mind spells (on my old server, we had enough higher level casters that Lesser Mind Blank and Mind Blank were both fairly common), that exact fighter/barbarian/rogue combo that Mort deplored just because I thought it would be fun to try, and so forth.

Or maybe I am overthinking this and all that needs to be done is to sticky this thread somewhere?