"Bardic music is not a performance enhancing drug!"
So, character creation. Stats aren't rated by hard numbers, but rather by what die you roll when you need to use that stat for something. So a Strength of six means you roll 1D6 when you need to roll Strength, and any time you need to roll it's usually two dice, as you need to roll on two stats or just roll the same one twice. There are four stats, Strength, which is everything about buffness and toughness, Dexterity, which is about being nimble and sure-handed, Intelligence, which is about learning and other brain things, and Spirit, which is about focus and conviction. All four start at six, and you can choose to lower one to a lower die to raise another to a higher, or have two high and two low. Strength affects your starting max Hit Points and carrying capacity, and Spirit affects your starting MP bonus. MP are not magic points, they're Mental Points, and this is an important distinction because non-mages can do things with them.
(A note on die rolls- two ones is a fumble, which usually has bad effects, and rolling two sixes or max on both dice is a critical, which means auto-success and possibly some other benefit.)
Unlike many RPGs I've played, being a generalist isn't such a bad idea, stat-wise, as all four stats are guaranteed to be used over the course of a traveling day, and there are a number of classes that use at least three out of the four stats.
Each character also starts with a proficiency in one of the five weapon types. Weapons roll two dice for accuracy and one die for damage, and weapons don't have their own fixed damage number, you actually roll one of your stats for damage. Light blades have an accuracy bonus but a damage penalty, meaning they're the only weapon which can do zero damage- however, their damage is based off of intelligence. Swords are the most basic and standard weapon. The two-handed weapons do make you give up using a shield (which are actually pretty useful) in exchange for certain tradeoffs. Polearms have a damage bonus, Axes have a slight accuracy penalty, but are based completely on Strength, so it's easier to improve your fighting ability, and bows have a bigger accuracy penalty, but can attack anything on the battlefield. Weapon masteries you gain at character creation give you a free weapon of that type. Using weapons you're not proficient in doesn't carry any rolling penalties, but it does cost you a bit of HP each time you attack.
On to the classes. Each class has three special skills, and there are four basic classes, recommended for new players, and three advanced classes, recommended for people with more experience. It's not that the advanced classes are more powerful, but they're a bit trickier to use to their fullest.
Minstrel
Bards, dancers, whatever. These are your basic traveling artists who live by public performance and whatnot, and that has a few benefits. Since minstrels generally wander anyway, they get a bonus to all rolls relating to actually traveling. They also get the ability to call on their knowledge of old songs and legends to try to turn up any relevant information if they encounter something related to that on the road.
As far as their music goes, Minstrels are basically Mog from Final Fantasy 6: Each session, a Minstrel can learn a new song based on a terrain or weather they encountered in that session, and then they can use that music whenever they encounter the terrain or weather that they learned the song in. As it's strenuous, it costs a little HP to use. Normally, it gives a bonus to the next rolls of all other party members, on a Critical it gives a much larger bonus, and on a fumble it has a possibility of making other party members temporarily dumber (drop INT by one die size) for having experienced your awful, awful performance.
Merchant
Capitalism, Ho! Merchants are the tradesmen who make sure that money and things get from one place or person to the other, and they are big on the art of making money and saving money. They have a bonus every time a negotiation roll is called for, on account of Merchants being sly devils, and since they're not going to carry all that junk themselves, they can also own three riding/pack animals without having to deal with maintenance instead of just one.
The big deal, about Merchants however, is their Trading ability, which allows them to roll when buying or selling items to see if they can reduce or increase the price, respectively- the higher the number, the greater the change in price, so having a Merchant can help make the most of the group's money.
Hunter
There are two classes which are about living off of the land, and this is the more violent way. Hunters are all about finding monsters and animals, plus the things you do with them after they're dead. They can actually track monsters and get a damage bonus against any that they actually find. They can also strip dead monsters for parts, as most monsters usually have something useful that can be pulled from them- though the tougher the monster, the harder it is.
Of course, hunters can actually find food, and the amount they find is based on how much they succeed by. On a Critical, all of the food they find is Delicious (which actually means something), and on a fumble they've found a way to get themselves a lingering injury which takes some of the DEX out of their step for a little while. It's worth noting that the Hunter's abilities roll against the terrain, so the difficulty of Hunter tasks depends on where you are more than what you're up against.
Healer
Doctor, Physician, Medicine Man, the Mr. or Mrs. Fix-it for your anatomy. Doctors can use herbs they find plus some of the party's water in order to restore HP to a character, but doing this in battle has a reduced effect, because you're making the concoction in a real big hurry. They can also temporarily nullify the effects of lingering status effects as well as reduce their severity, making it easier for a character to recover from them.
Of course, herbs don't come out of nowhere, so Healers can go searching for them before travel starts for the day. Herbs found this way spoil after a day, but there are ways to preserve them for longer. Success means you find one, a Critical means you find three, and a Fumble means you picked the wrong plant, bub, and are now filled with poison and feel somewhat woozy until that shakes out. The herbs available vary greatly depending on where you pick them, and many have effects on their own outside of being used for healing.
Those are the four basic classes, now for the advanced classes.
Farmer
This is the less violent way of living off the land (usually), and hey, who would've thought that people who are used to physical activity and her good with animals would be useful on long trips? Farmers get a boost to carrying capacity and Condition rolls, which makes it easier for them to shrug off injuries, illnesses, and other lingering effects. They can also handle more animals than normal, like the Merchant.
Now, the advanced classes tend to have quirks, and the Farmer is no exception. The Farmer has no set 3rd skill, but instead has an ability called Side Job, which represents what they do for money in the off-season. In effect, they can fill their third skill slot with an active, rolled skill from any other class in the game. This also means that Farmers have the most flexibility in where they assign their stats, as their rolled skill can be variable. The price for this is that the skill is performed at a slight penalty, compared to when it's used by a native member of that class.
Artisan
These are the crafters. the shoemakers, the blacksmiths, the whatever all else the builds the things. Because they know a thing or two about materials, this class can also strip monsters for parts. They can also fix broken and damaged things, at a cost of a percentage of the item's original price, and the difficulty is dependent on how expensive the item is- good luck fixing that Fabergé egg, chief.
Of course, for a higher percentage of the end cost, crafters can make things from scratch, but they can only choose one category of things to make. They can also be chefs, which works a bit differently, but can still provide some interesting results, like turning normal rations into Delicious food. Because of all this, however, a savvy crafter combined with a Merchant is pretty much a license to print money, and I'm sure that was intentional.
Noble
So, what can a noble lord or lady or knight or princess contribute to hard travel? Oh, right, they're educated. They know how to make a good impression in high society unlike the proles and serfs (though a farmer just might surprise), and they also have their own knowledge skill- while the Minstrel draws theirs from the old songs and legends, the Noble draws from the long hours of hard tutoring they invariably endure.
Of course, this being the fantasy world that it is, Nobles can also pick an additional weapon proficiency with either the Sword, Bow, or Polearms, and if they double up on something they already have, they get a to-hit bonus instead of getting another free weapon. Of course, the upshot of all this is that the Noble really has no directly applicable on-the-road skills whatsoever- the focus is on dealing with people in towns and settlements. Nobles also don't get more starting cash- they probably could only sneak so much out of the family vault or squeeze so much out of their parents.
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Note how I said there was spellcasting, and none of the above classes is Wizard? Well, that's because those sorts of specializations are covered by the three subtypes, which a character chooses one of at creation.
Attack characters gain a non-trivial max HP boost, and additional weapon proficiency, and a damage bonus.
Technical characters gain even more carrying capacity, an initiative bonus (which is actually even better than it sounds) and gaina high bonus when using MP to boost rolls.
Magic characters gain a non-trivial MP boost and the ability- you guessed it- to use spells.
Once the nitty gritty has been taken care of, there's the extra flavor bits:
Your character's Personal Item is something that they have a strong bond with but has no actual gameplay effect. It might be related to their past, profession, or even to why they've set out on the trip in the first place.
The Image Color is one that's strongly associated with your character. Either what they choose to wear or the character's favorite color, or whatever. The game playfully suggests getting a dice set whose color matches the one associated with your character.
And then there's the usual name/age/gender/whatever. That's just flavor because people can choose to go on the Journey at any stage in their life, so long as they're able-bodied enough to actually travel.
Even though I did do a lengthy writeup, it's actually pretty quick to make the actual character in this game- I don't have as much experience with this system as others, but I can still do it without even consulting the book.
Next up: Shopping and stuff.
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