Set up your Character

How to set up your Character:

Cortex Prime uses Prime Sets to determine the outcome of all actions. In Arylon, those Prime Sets are Attributes, Distinctions, and Skills/Proficiencies. Actions are determined by opposing rolls between the player and the GM, using a minimum of three dice-- one from each of the Prime Sets.
The three most important aspect of setting up your character are choosing a race and the Heritage Distinction to go with it, a Discipline (or Class), and a Background. These aspects will affect how the player assigns points to the character's Attributes and Skills. The point bank for Attributes and Skills is determined by the level of the compaign-- Greenhorn, Expery, or Legendary.
Plot Points give the player the ability to activate assets or extra dice to help the succeed in a scene that might otherwise go badly. Distinctions and Talents can provide opportunities for players to earn Plot Points. 
Assets are items or people that give the characters an edge. They can be something permanent or temporary. A Signature Asset is something special to the character, determined by the character's Background or created through role play. 
As play progesses, players earn Advance Points from the GM after each session, and by meeting personal Milestones. When they have enough Advance Points, players can increase stats in any of the Prime Sets, or on talents, spells, or assets.

D4 Hinders:

Every Distinction is automatically set at D8. They do NOT level up and nothing can increase or decrease them witin a scene. Spells and potions can affect Attributes or Skills but NOT Distinctions. When you're using your character's distinction in a scene, the d8 symbolizes the character shining brightly in that area. But no one excells at something every time. That wouldn't be realistic. To reflect this, the player may choose to roll a d4 instead, hindering themselves for that scene. When you do this the GM awards you a Plot Point. Your character may not be at their best at that moment, but that Plot Point will allow them to shine later.

Step One: Heratige

Choose a racial Heritage for your character. There are a lot to choose from. From the High Magic Shilen elves, to the magically-inclined human Keltori, to the magic-resistant Goldbrime dwarves. Each race has skills their people have a natural inclination toward, or that they consider important. Their young are encouraged to cultivate these skills and are considered odd if they don't. Each race also has Heritage talents. At character creation, choose one of these as your Heritage Distinction. The others become free minor talents under the spells and talents section of the character sheet. These minor talents start out at d6, but can be developed up to d12 during the game play. The one you chose as your Distinction can NEVER be taken from your character by any means, magical or otherwise. Unlike your other talents, which can be affected by spells, potions, or conditions.

• Albion
• Azurians
• Dwarves
• Elysorry Elves
• Half Elf
• Keltori human
• Lupins
• Lurkins
• Kobolds
• Odey Shashi
• Shilen Elves
• Sidhe
• Witch
• Warlock

Step Two: Discipline

Choose the Discipline/Class of your character. Is your character a sneaky rogue stealing from the unwary, a clever-speaking Bard who spies for the king, a clockwork engineer tinkering with new creations, or a mage studying the mysteries of the unknown? Each discipline has talents that are keyed to that specific playstyle. Listed below are a few examples of Disciplines, but players are not limited to these. Be creative and work with the GM to develop the Discipline that works for your character.

• Arcane Blade
• Fighter
• Priest
• Rogue/ Thief
• Shaman
• Wizard

Step Three: Background

Everyone has a history, and that history determines how we act in social situations, how we handle pressure, and what we like to do in our free time. A character's Background can allow them to shine in certain situations. Perhaps your character is a soldier (either active duty or retired), an alchemist, was raised by priests, or captured by bandits. The player can write a backstory to explain their character's Background. Any time the character's Background becomes relevant in the game, the player can add a d8 to their roll to help them succeed. For example, if the character was captured by bandits as a child and taught how to mug people and pickpocket, scenes that require a bit of slight of hand might benefit from the character's Background. On the other hand, sometimes the Background can cause problems. Perhaps our former bandit turned adventurer runs into the man who kidnapped him as a child. The character is full of rage and can't think straight. For the remainder of that scene, the player would use a Hinder to lower the die to a d4 and receive a Plot Point from the GM.

Step 4: Buying Attributes:

At character creation, all Attribute stats start off at d4. The GM awards points used to increase those stats based on the level of the Campaign. There are three Campaign levels: Greenhorn is for new players or players who want an easier, low-level Campaign. They receive 30 Attribute points for character creation. Expert is for players with a few games under their belt who want more of a challenge. They get 44 Attribute points. Legendary is for experienced players who want a game where the challenges have dire consequences and the rewards are great. They receive 54 Attribute points.
Players increase the die level of a stat by spending two points per step. In Arylon, there are 8 Attributes that affect a character's skills and abilities. At character creation, a Greenhorn can increase the character's three best stats to d12 and one to d10, leaving the rest at d4. For more balanced playstyle, the player would increase their best stat to d12, second best to d10, two to d8 and the remaining four to d6. In a similar fashion, Expert players coulf increase five stats to d12 with four points remaning, and Legendary players coulf increase six stats to d12 with six points remaining. Note: Any Attributes that a player gets from their Heritage Distinction receive an automatic 2 point reduction. For example, if a Keltori's Arcane Attunement gives them a d6 in Psyche, and they want to increase it to d10, they would spend 4 points instead of 6.

Advancing Attributes- after you have been playing your character for a while, and have been saving advance points, you may wish to spend some of those points to raise up an attribute. The cost to increase an Attribute to the next die step is the die type times 4. So if you have a d6 stat and you want to increase it to d8, the cost is 32 advance points. You must buy each die type as you increase. So if your stat is at d6 and you want it to be a d10, you must first purchase the d8 for 32 points, then spend an additional 40 points to reach d10.
*Note* When buying stats beyond d12, the cost equals both dice at four times the die. For example, to advance your stat to a D12+d4, the cost is 64 points. Then, to advance to the next level, you would spend 72 points to reach D12+d6.

The Attributes:

Skills and Attributes go hand in hand. There are four categories of Attributes, with two in each. All skills on the character sheet fall under one of these 4 catagories:
Physical- Strength and Agility Mental- Intelligence and Willpower Social- Charisma and Manipulate Spirit- Psyche and Presence
All the skills within a category can be paired with either of the associated Attributes depending on how the player wishes to use them within that scene. For example, not all fight skills are pure strength. Some require dexterity of hand or foot. On the other hand, a character using stealth for a long period of time may require strength instead of agility.
Strength- governs hitting power, how much you can lift, push, and drag, any other physical skill where the muscles may be pushed to the limit. Agility - governs dodging, movement speed, accuracy, number of times you can strike. Intelligence- governs learning, writing, reading, solving complex problems. Willpower- governs focusing under stress, applying routine trained skills, keeping your thoughts under the influences like beer. Charisma- governs how you handle social situations, how other perceive you, how well you tell a story or if you can bluff your ass off. Manipulate- governs your will over others, tricking people into trusting you, seducing them, getting people to do what you want. Psyche- governs the amount of magic you can cast, pushing your spirit to affect the physical world around you, blowing up an area with your spell. Presence- governs other spirits, preventing them from taking over you, fighting of mind-controlling spells of other casters, enchanting spirits into items, resisting spells effects. Note= Attributes and Skills can ONLY level up to d12+d12. Stats/Skills start d4 can advance to the max D12+D12. The plus die goes with the d12 and they are treated as one die. The plsu die cannot fail.

Step Five: Buying Skills:

Similar to Attributes, skills and talents are purchased using a bank of points received at character creation. Greenhorns receive 62 skill points, Experts get 68 points, and Legendary get 72 points. THIS BANK OF POINTS IS USED FOR SKILLS, PROFICIENCIES, TALENTS, AND SPELLS. Spend your points wisely. All skills start out at d4 as an untrained skill. d6 is considered trained, d8 is expert, d10 is adept, and d12 and above is mastered.
To buy a skill at character creation, the cost is half the fie type. For example, to buy a skill at d8, spend 4 points. If the character's Discipline gives them the skill at d6 automatically, subtract 3 points from the cost to increase (a mage that has mysticicm at d6 would spend 2 points to increase to d10 instead of 5). For any skill at d8 or above, you must choose a Proficiency-- an elite form of that particular skill. A fighter, for instance, may be a d6 for all fighting skills, with a d10 in rapiers. That means that while the fighter is good with any style, she excells with the rapier. A base skill have have up to 3 Proficiencies. Each one is bought separately and they do not have to be at the same die type.

Buying and Advancing Skills

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Dice	Buy Cost	Adv. Cost
6	3	12
8	4	16
10	5	20
12	6	24

To advance a skill during game play, players must spend advance points at two times the die type. As with Attributes, each step much be purchased separately, and skills about d12 cost the total of the d12 and the plus die (example: d12+d4= 32 advance points).
Example: Vonn the fire mage Mysticism d6 Evocation d12 Transmutation d10 Summoning d8

Step 6 Buying Talents:

Talents use the same bank of points as skills at character creation, and are bought and advanced the same way. (Note: this also applies to spells for spellcasters). Talents are special abilities or special skills that can add a die to your dice pool. Some talents can be used to influence a scene, or give the character an avantage in the scene. The player can spend a Plot Point to activate a talent in a scene. Some talents can also earn the player a Plot Point when Hindered.

ADVANCE POINTS:

At the end of every session the GM awards the players between 1-9 points. The players track their points in the advance points section on the character sheet. Players can also earn advance pionts by hitting Milestones. Milestone are tasks or goals the player character accomplishes during the session. There are three levels Milestones.

• 1 = A minor task or goal. This is something character does in every session, often multiple times per session. It can be something small, like a thief stealing an item from a merchant, or a wizard casting a spell in combat to help the group. it could also be a character using their catchphrase before battle, using the adventurer group's slogan to get a job, pr a prient uttering a prayer before an encounter.
• 3= A moderate task or goal. This is a time when the charcter gets to shine for a bit. Something like the wizard solving an arcane puzzels, since the character loves solving Arcane mysteries, or an adventurer turning in a difficuly mission, or a warrior defeating a powerful foe.
• 10= A major task or goal. This is a turning point in this character's story arc. Something like solving the mystery of what happened to the character's brother. Completing this task will often lead to a new problem. Was my brother behind his own disappearence? Was he the villian the whole time? These new mysteries will give the player their next major goal for the Campaign.

As the Campaign progresses, players will build up advance points to increase their stats, assets, skills, talents, and spells. Skills and spells are the easiest to increase, costing only double the next die step. As opposed to assests, talents, and Attributes, which cost four times the next die. Players should consider roleplay aspects when deciding what to increase. For example, if the character has been using a lot of agility in recent sessions, it wouldn't make sense for the player to increase Psyche at that time.

Life Pool:

The Life Pool of any character determines how much damage they can take before they die. To calculate the character's Life Pool, take the highest Physical Attribute, plus the highest Endurance skill, plus any Health talent the character has. Add up the max dice for the total. Example: Burgard the warrior. Strength is his highest Physical Attribute at d10, and his Endurance is d8, and he has the Tough as Nails Talent at d10 at character creation. This equals 28. The max Life Pool any character can have is 60. This can only be accomplished by having a Physical Attribute and an Endurance Proficiency at d12+d12 each, plus a Health talent at d12. (24+24+12=60) This cannot be done at character creation, even for Legendary players.

Signature Assets:

Signature assets are items of special significance to your character. How the character got the item is usually addressed in their backstory. These items can be anything-- a religious symbol handmade by the character's grandmother, the magic system they have devoted their life to studying (the spells themselves would go under the talents section, but the player can add an additional die to any roll involving this specific type of magic), a weapon they forged or upgraded themselves (such as the sword all Arcane Blades are required to create by hand to complete their training), or a Companion who is always at the character's side. For a Companion signature asset, the dice used are dependent on whether the Companion is fighting with the character, or acting on their own on behalf of the character or group. To have the Companion with you, simply add the Companion's asset die to your dice pool. To have them act on their own, thake the Companion die type and roll three of them together. The same Total and Effect slot rules apply to the Companion's roll.

Assets:

Normal assets are gained through roleplay. They can be purchased items, such as an Ogre Strength potion to temporarily step up the strength stat, or a weapon to add an extra die to a fight roll, or a spell the character uses frequently, such as a Heal spell to add to the character's Heal roll. Assests can be anything that might help the character in the scene, and can be something the character carries with them frequently, or something that is only availble for that particular scene.