There are two different types of Characters in Knight Realms, Player Characters and Non-Player Characters.  Both are vitally important to Knight Realms.  In fact, the game could not be played without both types of characters.  Below is a brief description of the two types followed by an overview of how to create a character.

Player Characters

Player characters (commonly referred to as PCs) are characters that you create to play at a Knight Realms event. These characters are the "Heroes," or main characters of the gaming world. PCs have the freedom to act however they wish, their only restrictions being the rules of the game. These characters are played for the entire event and will grow in power and experience with each event you attend as that character. It is possible for a player to have more than one PC, but we ask that you try to make them appear distinctly different from each other. A player is allowed to play more than one PC at an event, but may only change PCs at Period Change, or with the direct permission of the Director. We strongly suggest reading through the entire rulebook before attempting to create a player character. PCs are created using the procedures given in this chapter.

Non-Player Characters

Non-Player characters (commonly referred to as NPCs) are characters that are created by and played under the direction of a Knight Realms qualified staff member, usually the Monster Marshal that is on duty at the time. Players can play NPCs for an entire event and still earn experience to assign to their player character. While most NPC roles are monsters, villagers, and "bad guys" they may also be powerful individuals of virtually any class or race. Not only is NPC’ing an exciting experience, it's free, too! Knight Realms also requires its PCs to partake in NPC duty. NPC duty is a four-hour slot in which everyone must NPC unless otherwise decided by a Director. NPC’ing is a great way to have fun, provide a service to the game, gain role-playing and acting experience, and gain some build for your PC. Try it out!

1st Level Characters

Beginning characters start with their first profession free and they receive 10 build to spend on starting skills. Players may also choose to start their character as a commoner.  Such characters will begin with no profession list and an additional 10 build that they are allowed to spend at character creation.  These characters can only buy skills from the Common list, and cannot buy body, caster, or career points. See below, point 6, for more details on determining starting build.

Creating a Character

1. Select the race of your character

You must decide if you wish to be a human, a human subclass (such as gypsy, barbarian, etc.), a demi-human (elf, dwarf, etc.), a goblinoid, or a mystical race (dryad, satyr). If you are new to live-action role-playing then we suggest your first player character be human or you spend some time NPCing the race you wish to play beforehand.

Being a race other than human requires you to follow a set of racial rules. Races have specific costuming, make up, and behavioral requirements that must be followed by characters of that race. If these requirements are not being followed properly, you may be asked to play a human.

You will have to get approval before playing certain races, due to the rarity of the race or intense role-playing requirements. These races include Dark Elf, Hobgoblin, and Jaxuarian.

2. Select the profession of your character

When choosing a profession you may decide on traditional Fighter, Mage, or Thief professions which have a large selection of varied skills or you may select a profession that is more specialized such as a Swashbuckler or Berserker.

Using the Swashbuckler and Berserker as examples, let’s compare the differences. While Swashbucklers and Berserkers are both fighters and can learn some of the same skills 9such as Critical Attack), they are clearly different from each other. The greatest difference is emphasized in costuming and role-playing, but they also have skills and skill costs tailored to their professions. Berserkers have fighting skills focused on brute strength (such as Cleave, and Strength +1), while Swashbucklers distinguish themselves in battle using dexterity (Weapon Proficiency +1 and Feint). Some skills are unique to these professions, and others are common between them but have different costs, based on which profession is more naturally practiced at them.

Role-playing points and other recognitions will be awarded to players who most closely role-play their characters as intended. Don’t choose to play a Berserker and react to every situation calmly and rationally, nor choose to play a Swashbuckler and fight like a rabid animal drooling over roadkill while wearing a burlap sack tied with a rope. There are many unique ways to play any one profession, but the basic concept of a profession is something that should be a part of the role-playing of any character.

3. Name your character

Come up with a name for your character. Traditionally, most characters have first and last names, just as modern people do. If your character does not have a last name, or has several, think of a reason why. Make sure that the name is one that you like because you will use it for the duration of your character's life. You must exercise at least a small amount of originality. Players will not be permitted to name their characters after well-known main characters of published media. As a general guideline if the name was a character of more than one published novel, or a lead role in a movie, TV series, or video game, do not try to use the name for your character at Knight Realms.

4. Decide if your character follows a religion

Decide if your character strongly believes in a particular fictitious deity provided in the story world. This must be recorded because there are game statistics that may affect your character during game-play based on in-game religious devotion. You may certainly decide that your character does not believe in the deities or simply chooses not to follow any of them.

5. Make a note of any Out-of-Game medical status

If you have a medical situation such as allergies or anything that requires you to take medicine or be carefully watched, make sure you have it recorded onto your character card.

6. Determine your starting Build

Determine how many points of Build your character will start off with. As a starting character you are given 10 Build. If you have acquired Service Points (SP) you may spend up to 200 SP to gain an additional 1 to 2 Build. If you purchased the Extra Event Build, you would gain an additional 1 Build. All together you may start your character off with anywhere between 10 and 13 Build that you may immediately spend on skills before starting the game.  (You may also have more build if you retire an old PC, but that is not covered here.)  If you somehow have more than 13 build when making a new PC, you may not spend more than 13 to start - the rest must be saved for later.  The only exception to this is Retirement Build and the build gained through purchasing a hard copy of the Rulebook (this is not currently available).

Regardless of how much build the character starts with, all normal limits (such build spent on body per level) apply at character creation.

Once the PC is in the game, you can spend her build as quickly as prerequisites allow.

7. Review your Skill Lists

Thoroughly read through the skill list for your chosen profession and the skill list for your race if you are playing a non-human.

8. Spend your starting Build

After determining your starting amount of build and reviewing your skill lists, decide how you would like to spend your starting Build on these skill lists. The skills you purchase are the skills that your character already knows how to perform coming into the game. Make sure you follow any pre-requisite rules. Note that you will start with a number of Body Points based on your character’s race, and if your profession has any other points-based abilities (Magic, Faith, etc.), you start with 1 point in each given area. You may spend build to increase these, or leave them at their starting scores.

9. Your character’s history

Write an interesting history for your character. Your history doesn’t have to read like a Hemingway novel or be as detailed as the Iliad, but it should describe the basic details of your character’s background. In particular, your character’s history should explain where your character comes from, what his or her ambitions are, and why he or she has traveled to the town of Travance. The more detailed you want to be, and the more thoughtful you’d like to make your prose, the better.  You can download a History Worksheet for your convenience.  Your character's history must be submitted to the Director no more than two months after you begin playing it, and must be approved before you may act upon anything containted in it.

10. Bring this information to the game

Now that you have made all of these decisions, write them all down and bring them with you to a Knight Realms event. At sign-in in Logistics, a Marshal will help you to transfer all of this information onto a new Knight Realms character sheet.

11. Oops, I don’t like my character…

Don’t worry; you always have the option of changing all of the above character aspects between your character’s first event and its second. For example, if after one event as an elven mage you decide that playing that character isn’t for you, but that a human warrior seems just right, you may switch. Be a little surer of your choice the second time around, however, because after your character’s second event its attributes are locked in.

Example #1:

John is going to his first Knight Realms game. He’s read over the website and decided to make a PC - at least in concept - before his first game so that he can prepare to play it.

John is going to take a human for his character’s race – no makeup, no prosthetics, easy to role-play. He could go with a human sub-class such as a Gypsy, Celt, or Barbarian, but he just wants a plain vanilla human for now. John has played some tabletop role-playing games before, but he doesn’t feel very comfortable with acting in a live situation. From what his friends tell him the combat is fun, so he chooses a Warrior – not too heavy on the role-playing, and lots of combat.

Now that John has his character’s race and profession settled, he goes to work on the finer details – a list of starting skills, a character name, and a brief background and personality. Looking at the Warrior and the Common skill lists, he chooses 10 Build worth of skills for his character: Literacy (1 Build), Small Weapon (1 Build), Edged Mastery (3 Build), and Shield Mastery (2 Build). John decides to spend the remaining 3 Build on Body points. The Warrior List shows "Body: (3) 1/3", so for each Build he spends, he gets three Body Points. The most he can spend on Body Points is three Build per level (the number in the parentheses).  He’s going to donate some supplies to the game to get some Service Points, which he can immediately convert into two more Build, but he can't spend that build at character creation.

John decides that his character is the second son of a small landowner in the Barony of Fenrick. With nothing to inherit, his character decided to strike out on his own and seek a life of adventure. To add a little twist, John decides that his character acquired his sword and shield by pilfering his father’s brooch – a family heirloom – and pawning it in exchange. His character is now poised to arrive in the town of Travance, a world of opportunity (and danger) ahead of him.

The last detail is a name. Since John’s character is a standard human from the Kingdom or Kormyre, he decides to give his character a first and last name, as is the custom. John’s character will be called Richard Foirremour.  He writes this all up and sends it in to the Chief Character Officer for approval, making sure he meets the deadline of having it in before his PC's third event.  He also takes note that he can't act on any of this until the background is approved, but that is fine as he still has plenty of room to Role-Play and explore the character without drawing on details from his background.

With all this in mind, John puts together a simple costume for his first event, and sits down with his friends to make a boffer sword and a medium shield.

Example #2:

After about a year of playing, John is having a blast at KR, but wants to try playing something new. He still likes combat, but he’s gotten to like role-playing, and from NPCing a few times he finds he likes being more elaborate with costuming. With this in mind, he sets out to make a new character. John does not retire Richard Foirremour - which would give him additional build for the new character - since he still wants to play the sturdy young warrior from time to time.

John has some clear ideas about his new character concept: He still wants to fight, but in addition, he wants a profession that requires intensive role-playing and heavy makeup and costuming. Looking at his options, he decides to make a Hobgoblin Cleric – a good mix between a fighter, a priest (allowing for role-playing), and certainly a lot of makeup! Before he does anything else, he gets approval to play a Hobgoblin (a restricted race) from the Atomsphere Officer ( This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it ). He then sits down and chooses starting skills for his character. Being a new character, he has ten Build to start with, plus two more with Service Points that he can convert, for a total of twelve starting Build for this character. Before he can do anything else, he needs to choose a deity, which will determine what prayers he can use. After looking through the religion section, he chooses to have his character worship Valos, deity of Light and Order.  John then chooses his starting Prayer Domains.  All Clergy start with the Sacrament Domain and looking up Valos, John sees he can choose from Law, Light, and War.  He chooses the War Domain.

Next, John chooses his starting skills: Mace (The favored weapon of Valos, which is 2 Build on the Cleric list), Small Shield (2 Build), Lore Divinity (1 Build) - required for Prayers - 2 Rank I Prayers (1 Build each), and the remaining 5 Build he will put into Faith Points, giving him 5 additional points over his starting Faith Point, for a total of 6.

With the stats laid out, John needs to come up with a background. Devising a reason for a Hobgoblin to be a follower of Valos will take a little more work and creativity than the background for Richard Foirremour. Over a feverish session at his computer, an inspired John works on a narrative that describes his character’s journey from New Gaaldaron to the wilderness as a young boy, running away from parents who sought to commit him to their priesthood. He was taken in by a charitable sylvan elf, of all unlikely rescuers. As he matured, the Hobgoblin boy decided to dedicate his life to Valos, as a very specific turn on his parents’ ambitions. John goes into detail about the relationship between this sylvan elf and his character, and finally explains a circumstance by which this character is now coming to Travance.  Somewhere in writing all that background, John came up with the name Dreslen D’ohdra for his character. He then fills out the History Worksheet, and sends it to the Chief Character Officer ( This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it ) for approval before bringing the PC into the game.

Example #3:

Bob, John’s father, is now curious about Knight Realms after hearing about the game from his son and his friends. He decides to go out and see what his son is doing on the weekends.

Bob asks his son for advice on making a character. They determine that he would not like combat, and is not looking for a very action-oriented or costume-heavy character. He decides to make a Priest, so that he can role-play such things as mass, benedictions, and so on, while having prayers that will allow him to be useful in supporting a battle. He looks at the deities, and deciding that Valos is a little too combat-oriented for him, settles on Gaia.  Bob then chooses his starting Prayer Domains.  All Clergy start with the Sacrament Domain and looking up Gaia, Bob sees he can choose from Life, Light, and Purification.  He chooses the Life Domain.

Bob then spends his 10 Build to create his Priest. He takes Staff (2 Build), Literacy (1 Build), Advanced Literacy (1 Build), Lore: Divinity (1 Build), 2 Rank II Prayers (1 Build Each), and spends 3 Build on Faith Points - giving him 3 additional Faith Points to his starting 1 for a total of 4.

Bob decides to write his character as an older man, since he himself isn’t quite as spry as he once was. He decides that the man was a free farmer, who leased his crop fields from a minor lord and lived an otherwise ordinary life with a wife and two sons. One night, a terrible flood destroyed his home and carried off his family, leaving him alone and destitute. He joined the priesthood of Gaia in search of solace, and to pledge his life to the protection of life. Having recently completed his vows, Bob’s character has decided to travel to Travance, where he has heard that many people and animals are in need of Gaia’s protection. Once there, he can put his farming skills to use on the property around the monastery, producing crops of vegetables and herbs.

Finally, Bob decides to name his character Father Giles Meservald. He will pronounce the first name as the French “zheel”, for a little exotic flair.

Follow these steps and read the rest of the rulebook. You should then have a unique and interesting character ready to explore the mysterious lands of Knight Realms.