A character trait isn’t just another kind of power you add on to your character — it’s a way to quantify, and encourage, building a character background that fits what a player envisions or as a means to build a vision of a character. Think of character traits as “story seeds” for your background; after you figure out your character’s traits, you’ll have points of inspiration from which to build your character’s personality and history.
Alternatively, if you’ve already thought of a background for your character, you can view creating traits as a way to quantify that background, just as race, class, and ability scores quantify a character's other strengths and weaknesses as well as shapes who that character is.
- Trait bonuses do not stack with other trait bonuses — they’re intended to put substance behind a character's background story and give you a slight edge over the non-PCs of the world, not a secret backdoor to focus all your traits on one type of bonus to gain an unseemly advantage over the rules. It’s certainly possible that the benefits from different traits are similar, or even the same; you do not add together those bonuses but rather choose the better of the two or pick a different trait.
- Traits should fit in with your character's story - not be just a vehicle for more bonuses. Pick traits that suit your character based on the vision of what you want your character to be and not the bonuses a trait may grant.
- Traits are intended to model events that were formative in your character’s development, either before they became an adventurer or events that happened while adventuring. Even if they become a hermit and abandon society, they'll still retain their knowledge and training of light weapons from being a Swashbuckler.
A quick rule of thumb to judge a trait's power is to think of it as a 'half feat'; so two traits are about the same power as a single feat.
Earning Traits:
Characters start with 2 Basic trait with no more than 1 from any category, and all Racial traits. A new base trait may be earned 4th level (4,8,12,16,20). These new traits must be tied directly to some formidable experience or epic encounters that a character was involved in - thus players describe the evolution of their characters' persona as the story progresses - adding tangible results to those experiences.
Trait Types:
Basic Traits
o Combat Traits - Traits related directly to combat actions, skills, maneuvers, etc.
o Faith Traits - Traits based on a character's faith to a deity, religion, or even lack of faith.
o Magic Traits - Traits related directly casting spells, magical abilities, magic attacks, etc.
o Social Traits - Traits associated with a character's social upbringing, cultural associations, moral conduct, etc.
Racial Traits
o Inherited Traits - Olfactory Traits; Natural or innate magical Traits; Traits based on bloodline or heredity.
o Learned Traits - Racial enemies; Weapon familiarity; Languages.