I need some quick characters

[tedcahill2]

In my last game my players each chose an item at random off a wall. Their choice determined who their reincarnated spirit was in a previous life, and in this next game they will be inhabiting the body of their past self in a flashback type game arc.

Is there a way to quickly create these other characters for them? I need to make 7 level 9ish characters.

[Deadline]

In my last game my players each chose an item at random off a wall. Their choice determined who their reincarnated spirit was in a previous life, and in this next game they will be inhabiting the body of their past self in a flashback type game arc.

Is there a way to quickly create these other characters for them? I need to make 7 level 9ish characters.

You could probably just pull 7 of the example characters/iconics from the various books, and spot check them for errors.

[Zaq]

You could probably just pull 7 of the example characters/iconics from the various books, and spot check them for errors.

That would probably take longer than just building new stuff from the ground up. Example stat blocks are hilariously awful.

My biggest advice would be to avoid PrCs unless they’ve got super easy prereqs, since arranging the timing of skills and feats to qualify on time is going to be a point of slowdown. Multiclassing is fine (no one wants a level 9 Fighter unless you’re doing something wacky with the Zhentarim ACF), but PrCs will take longer to build. You don’t have to fully flesh these characters out, so pretty much just pick one main trick or one main combat style, slap together some feats that support it, pick some semi-reasonable skills, and call it a day. I feel like this is one of those times when it’ll take more time plotting a way around the work than it would take to just do the work, since you don’t need these characters to be paragons of perfect character optimization.

Alternatively, if you like the pregen idea, you can present the stat blocks as-is, errors and all. This is to a flashback, right? Maybe the memory of the spirit isn’t perfect. Just make it clear that this doesn’t set a precedent regarding how numbers or qualifications are handled.

[Grod_The_Giant]

PHB 2 has some decent quick-gen options-- for each of the core+complete base classes, they have three example feat progressions, skills, and NPC WBL. You should be able to slap together characters pretty quickly using those. Simple is probably good, given that it sounds like this will be a pretty one-off thing.

[Darrin]

Go to the most recent Iron Chef thread (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?542380-Iron-Chef-Optimisation-Challenge-in-the-Playground-XC). Browse through the previous rounds in the first post and look for a PrC that fits the "flavor" of what you're looking for or just sounds interesting. Then look through the builds and pick one. Most entries come pre-built with a personality, backstory, etc.