My system uses four primary Factors to determine character ability: Body, Mind, Voice, and Essence. When I was building my pregens, it was easiest for me to lay things out in a quad-type layout, with each factor getting it's own section, under which I list the resources, skills, abilities, attacks, and armor associated with each.
I've been debating if this is a reasonable way of actually laying out a character sheet, or if it would be better to have a section that gives the core factor values with their resources and maybe armor separate from a section for abilities separate from a section for skills and so on. I think this second is probably be better way of doing things, which is unfortunate just because it means reformatting everything I've done.
My next concern is, perhaps, less significant, but not insignificant altogether. How to layout the sheet. Do I want to have a portrait oriented page, or landscape?
When I first started getting into Numenera, I thought that the character sheets looked really cool. They had this cool tri-fold structure where they folded up like pamphlets, which seemed new and nifty to me. They also had a lot of really cool decorative drawings across them, which was pretty neat too.
However, when I started designing characters and trying to put the information on them, I found that these sheets weren't the most efficient. I was frustrated with not being able to really list out my abilities, or even my equipment very well. I felt like there was a lot of wasted space. To begin with, there were entire sections, mostly those on the front, that I either wasn't using at all or was using very little. But, on top of that, all the nifty drawings and artwork, while looking cool, was taking up space that could otherwise have been used for actual information.
Because of the lack of space, if I was using the Numenera character sheets, I would have to have another page on which I printed the full text of my abilities, which, in my mind, sort of defeated the point in having them written on a character sheet.
Recently, Monte Cook Games has come out with a character portfolio that you can download and print which addresses this, mostly by adding a lot more pages in which you can put additional information. I'm fine with that.
But that didn't exist at the time, so I made a bunch of my own character sheets. Since a majority of my experience before Cypher System had been 3.5/Pathfinder, I laid out my custom sheets more or less exactly like the ones for those games, and this worked for me. Eventually, I made sheets trying to imitate the trifold layout of the Numenera sheets, but making a better use of the space. This worked out pretty well too.
But now I'm just trying to decide what to do with my own.
What do you think? Are there character sheets that you've particularly liked or not liked? What do you like or not like when it comes to character sheets?
I have often found myself scrambling to keep track of new spells, abilities, etc. when my character sheet didn't have more space. In general, in most RPGs I've played, I've felt limited by tiny lines. Maybe even having more blank space (not lined) under sections would allow players more flexibility. I do like the idea of a portfolio. Or even something electronic could be ideal. If players all have access to smart phones, tablets, etc., that could be a good way to be able to easily edit/add info. However, I often like having a hard copy too... So I apologize that this comment isn't more helpful. :-P
ReplyDeleteI agree with the thought on digital vs. paper. When I'm planning and making character sheets, I absolutely prefer to use digital, but I like having paper when I'm actually playing. I also have mixed feelings on my players using digital devices during play, since it can encourage other distractions like social media and texting which can cause players to become distracted and non-responsive to the game.
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