KiriKaneko
Veteran
I couldn't find a list of character creation options so I made one myself. It goes without saying but if you want to roleplay you won't need this, but the character creation options are very different with some clearly stronger than others, and your choices will lock you into a certain role or potentially keep you from being the best at what you want to do so even for a roleplayer it might be worth checking to see what "class" you are picking
Base:
Str 7 Agi 7 Int 5 Cha 6
Ironflesh 1 Athletics 2 Leadership 1 Power Strike 1 Riding 1
Gender:
Male: Str+1 Cha+1
Female: Agi+1 Int+1
The genders are balanced. Men make better leaders and can potentially take more damage and dish it out better, females can potentially get higher weapon skills and speed and are more suited to getting the party skill bonuses and persuasion skills of intelligence, but it's not a big difference
Job:
Cop: Str+2 Cha+2 Leadership+2. Total: 4 attributes, 2 skills
Mall Guard: Str+2 Ironflesh+1 Power Strike+1. Total: 2 attributes, 2 skills
Teacher: Agi+2 Int+2 Tracking+1 Pathfinding+1 First Aid+1. Total: 4 attributes, 3 skills
Doctor: Agi+1 Int+4 Wound Treatment+3 Surgery+3 First Aid+3 Leadership+1. Total: 5 attributes, 10 skills
Shop Owner: Str+1 Int+1 Ironflesh+1 Looting+1 Inventory Management+3. Total: 2 attributes, 5 skills
The jobs are very clearly not balanced. Mall guard has only 2 attributes and 2 skills, whereas doctors have 5 attributes and 10 skills. That said they do tend to specialise in certain areas. Cops are leaders and merchants with the same strength as mall guards. Mall guards are pure warriors with the strength of a cop and 2 skill points in melee skills, the lower charisma and leader is no big deal if you plan to focus entirely on str/agi to become the best warrior. Teachers have the most agility, making them the best agile warriors and looters, but even an agile warrior will want the str skills that mall guards start with unless they're going purely for firearms and want to maximise athletics and weapon mastery. Doctors are medics and their high intelligence makes them best in the long run at any intelligence skills, they lack the headstart on pathfinding that teachers get but start with more skill points and higher intelligence anyway and have only 1 less agility as well. shop owners are... well awful. They can carry a lot but it's not hard for anyone to get inventory management and cops make better traders with their high starting charisma.
So in short:
Cops: Best Charisma, good Strength, combat trader, slaver and mercenary leader archetype (Perhaps a police chief?)
Mall Guard: Good Strength, starting combat skills, strength warrior archetype (lowest attribute and skill point bonus but both are in strength and melee skills unlike cop)
Teacher: Best Agility, looter and agile warrior archetype (perhaps it is a gymnastics teacher?)
Doctor: Massive intelligence, some agility, tons of medic skills, party skills, persuader and faction ruler archetype (also highest attribute and skill point bonus total)
Shop owner: Bad. (absolutely not a trader due to no extra charisma or trade skill, doctor can get the IM with just the starting intelligence bonus. Why does this exist?)
How was life before?:
Good: Nothing
OK: +1 Looting
Bad: +2 Looting
Not sure if you start with extra money or renown or something but the extra skill points are something you probably want. +1 to party looting is helpful in the long run and renown/cash can always be farmed
I only picked rifle called Eli for the other choices. I doubt they impact the player's skills or attributes but haven't checked. I only ever actually started with a rifle as a cop or a shop owner though, everyone else had a pistol so I don't know what the rifle thing is about, it might just be forfeiting the starting companion
IMHO the classes need to be balanced. I would recommend:
Cop: Should probably change this to str/agi and it can be a balanced combat character. Swap leader for WM.
Mall Guard: give a higher boost to strength and some more combat skills with a focus on melee combat
Teacher: Change to gym teacher, higher boost to agility, swap the pathfinding, tracking and first aid for some agility skills like athletics/riding/WM
Doctor: Take the point of agility away. Lower the medic skills to 2 and give some persuasion to make it clear what this class is about
Shop Owner: Take away the str/int and give a big bonus to charisma. Keep the IM but add in some trader/leader/PM skill. Add flavor text in the description after picking it that says this background had employees (thus leader/PM)
I haven't bothered to include changes to weapon skills/money/renown/honor etc because those are all things you can change through your actions in game. I was more interested in attributes/skills since those are in more limited supply outside of mods like prophesy of pendor so you have to pick those far more carefully and your character creation options ultimately decide your "class" in regards to those. It's better to pick a class for it's attributes/skills than it's starting weapon proficiencies because of that.
I'd also like to request that future releases say what you get from each choice. The names alone are misleading. I thought teacher would have intelligence and trainer, I thought shop owner would be a trader, I had no idea that cops made the best merchants. I thought cops would be agi/str with a gun focus and mall guards would be skewed more towards strength with much more melee skill.
Base:
Str 7 Agi 7 Int 5 Cha 6
Ironflesh 1 Athletics 2 Leadership 1 Power Strike 1 Riding 1
Gender:
Male: Str+1 Cha+1
Female: Agi+1 Int+1
The genders are balanced. Men make better leaders and can potentially take more damage and dish it out better, females can potentially get higher weapon skills and speed and are more suited to getting the party skill bonuses and persuasion skills of intelligence, but it's not a big difference
Job:
Cop: Str+2 Cha+2 Leadership+2. Total: 4 attributes, 2 skills
Mall Guard: Str+2 Ironflesh+1 Power Strike+1. Total: 2 attributes, 2 skills
Teacher: Agi+2 Int+2 Tracking+1 Pathfinding+1 First Aid+1. Total: 4 attributes, 3 skills
Doctor: Agi+1 Int+4 Wound Treatment+3 Surgery+3 First Aid+3 Leadership+1. Total: 5 attributes, 10 skills
Shop Owner: Str+1 Int+1 Ironflesh+1 Looting+1 Inventory Management+3. Total: 2 attributes, 5 skills
The jobs are very clearly not balanced. Mall guard has only 2 attributes and 2 skills, whereas doctors have 5 attributes and 10 skills. That said they do tend to specialise in certain areas. Cops are leaders and merchants with the same strength as mall guards. Mall guards are pure warriors with the strength of a cop and 2 skill points in melee skills, the lower charisma and leader is no big deal if you plan to focus entirely on str/agi to become the best warrior. Teachers have the most agility, making them the best agile warriors and looters, but even an agile warrior will want the str skills that mall guards start with unless they're going purely for firearms and want to maximise athletics and weapon mastery. Doctors are medics and their high intelligence makes them best in the long run at any intelligence skills, they lack the headstart on pathfinding that teachers get but start with more skill points and higher intelligence anyway and have only 1 less agility as well. shop owners are... well awful. They can carry a lot but it's not hard for anyone to get inventory management and cops make better traders with their high starting charisma.
So in short:
Cops: Best Charisma, good Strength, combat trader, slaver and mercenary leader archetype (Perhaps a police chief?)
Mall Guard: Good Strength, starting combat skills, strength warrior archetype (lowest attribute and skill point bonus but both are in strength and melee skills unlike cop)
Teacher: Best Agility, looter and agile warrior archetype (perhaps it is a gymnastics teacher?)
Doctor: Massive intelligence, some agility, tons of medic skills, party skills, persuader and faction ruler archetype (also highest attribute and skill point bonus total)
Shop owner: Bad. (absolutely not a trader due to no extra charisma or trade skill, doctor can get the IM with just the starting intelligence bonus. Why does this exist?)
How was life before?:
Good: Nothing
OK: +1 Looting
Bad: +2 Looting
Not sure if you start with extra money or renown or something but the extra skill points are something you probably want. +1 to party looting is helpful in the long run and renown/cash can always be farmed
I only picked rifle called Eli for the other choices. I doubt they impact the player's skills or attributes but haven't checked. I only ever actually started with a rifle as a cop or a shop owner though, everyone else had a pistol so I don't know what the rifle thing is about, it might just be forfeiting the starting companion
IMHO the classes need to be balanced. I would recommend:
Cop: Should probably change this to str/agi and it can be a balanced combat character. Swap leader for WM.
Mall Guard: give a higher boost to strength and some more combat skills with a focus on melee combat
Teacher: Change to gym teacher, higher boost to agility, swap the pathfinding, tracking and first aid for some agility skills like athletics/riding/WM
Doctor: Take the point of agility away. Lower the medic skills to 2 and give some persuasion to make it clear what this class is about
Shop Owner: Take away the str/int and give a big bonus to charisma. Keep the IM but add in some trader/leader/PM skill. Add flavor text in the description after picking it that says this background had employees (thus leader/PM)
I haven't bothered to include changes to weapon skills/money/renown/honor etc because those are all things you can change through your actions in game. I was more interested in attributes/skills since those are in more limited supply outside of mods like prophesy of pendor so you have to pick those far more carefully and your character creation options ultimately decide your "class" in regards to those. It's better to pick a class for it's attributes/skills than it's starting weapon proficiencies because of that.
I'd also like to request that future releases say what you get from each choice. The names alone are misleading. I thought teacher would have intelligence and trainer, I thought shop owner would be a trader, I had no idea that cops made the best merchants. I thought cops would be agi/str with a gun focus and mall guards would be skewed more towards strength with much more melee skill.
