Yet another idea that was brewing in my head recently. The idea came from Small World.

A small deck of archetype cards 6 or so cards each player chooses from at the start of the game. Each card has multiple copies. Each carddetermines character's starting gold and other stuff, and also allows to spend trophy points to upgrade things that couldn't be upgraded before.

NAME - name is a prefix, so you can identify your character as an Arcane Troll or Scholarly Dread Knight for example.

STARTING GOLD - your gold at the start of the game. If your character gives you gold as well, add both values.

CARRYING LIMIT - limit of objects you can carry.

UPGRADE COST X / Y - How many trophy points of any type you need to spend to increase said parameter. First increase costs X, second increase costs Y. 3rd increase is not possible.

FOLLOWER LIMIT - I play with a limit on followers similar to the one on objects.

SPELL LIMIT - no longer governed by Craft, but instead by those cards. Note that if you don't choose either Scholarly or Arcane, some character will not be able to use some of their abilities to the fullest.

LIFE / FATE BONUS - The bonus indicates how many free lives or fate tokens you get at the start, but once those are gone, they are gone.

VALUE UPGRADE COST - Like normal upgrade, but this increases life/fate value.

How about a die roll when you first pick your character. 1-3 no archetype buff, 4-5 pick one at random, 6 pick one of your choice. Otherwise all characters may be a little too powerful early on.

I like this. But each archetype should just have 2 abilities one gives you something one takes something eg.

Chosen: Once you have 4 followers you may +1 to your movement roll.

You start the game with one less fate (min of 1).

Then you can say players draw 3 at the start of the game and choose one to go with their character. Then a set of 21-24 would be good.

How about a die roll when you first pick your character. 1-3 no archetype buff, 4-5 pick one at random, 6 pick one of your choice. Otherwise all characters may be a little too powerful early on.

I don't see it. And something like this shouldn't be random.

I like this. But each archetype should just have 2 abilities one gives you something one takes something eg.

Why?

I like this. But each archetype should just have 2 abilities one gives you something one takes something eg.

Why?

Because too many rules on a card is confusing even if they are "take another gold". And limiting it to only 2 gives more choice to streamline the cards to improve some already poor characters. Thus you're using this to balance the characters out a bit as well as adding fun and entertaining effects to make the game better.

As well the rules would be a lot simpler as well,

But it's upto you of course but great ideas I may have to nick them .

Because too many rules on a card is confusing even if they are "take another gold". And limiting it to only 2 gives more choice to streamline the cards to improve some already poor characters. Thus you're using this to balance the characters out a bit as well as adding fun and entertaining effects to make the game better.

As well the rules would be a lot simpler as well,

Because too many rules on a card is confusing even if they are "take another gold". And limiting it to only 2 gives more choice to streamline the cards to improve some already poor characters. Thus you're using this to balance the characters out a bit as well as adding fun and entertaining effects to make the game better.

As well the rules would be a lot simpler as well,

I think only playtesting could answer something like this. But I don't think this would be hard to remember because they are not trigger abilities.

Yeh true. But think of the opportunity with these cards, you can make some poor characters a better choice to take if a player draws them.

I think I'm gonna drop this version in favor of ability cards.

A cool idea, though I feel there might be some problems with the spell limit when it comes to characters who can spell cycle.