You've got to make a new character for a Role-Playing game that your friend is going to run this weekend, but you have no idea what to play. What to do…what to do…Should you play a hulking barbarian that carries a battleaxe the size of a small child, a bandit to whom stealing is as natural as breathing or do you play the wizard who could change an orc into a newt with a wave of his hand. And then there's coming up with a name too!!! In this article, I'll try to give you a few ideas that might make this choice a little easier.

Some people like to start off by rolling their character up first and then fleshing them out from there, but I always like having a name first. The character seems to flow onto paper more smoothly for me if I already have one set down. If you have a different pattern, ignore the next few lines of this article and come back to read them later.

I know that it's normally a bad thing to do, but in naming your character, anything's fair game. If you can't come up with a name on your own, look to movies and books for inspiration. Go and read J.R.R. Tolkien's Lord of the Rings trilogy (if your one of the 5 people who haven't yet) for some great fantasy names. Watch Star Wars again and focus on some of the names of the background characters. Go rent some cheesy fantasy/sci-fi flick and swipe the name from there. There are lots of cool names out there…you just have to pay attention.

After you create (or borrow) a name for your character, you need to determine what race your character is and their profession. Depending on what particular game you are playing, these two categories may be limited or endless. Read about all the different races and professions you have to choose from thoroughly before making a decision as to which one you will stick with. Try out different combinations that you haven't thought of before. I personally had a ton of fun playing a goblin berserker who had an intense hatred of cows. Then there was the dwarf monk who trained be a ninja someday.

The most memorable characters are not always the toughest ones, so don't let low stats keep you from playing a certain race or profession. Make a fighter who has a terrible strength, but is an expert tactician on the battlefield. Or you can make a thief who is somewhat clumsy so he/she focused on the how to break open doors and chests by knowing their weak spots. A great character is not high numbers. A truly great character is one who has weaknesses and flaws, but finds ways to achieve in spite of this.

Below is a small random race/profession chart to help get your imagination started. This chart would work best in Star Wars or D&D, but I tried to make it general enough so that it could be used in lots of others as well. There are hundreds of other races and professions that could have been included, but I tried to keep it simple by only having a few for each. If you want to add more or change any of them, feel free to change as much as you want.

I hope that I might have given you a few good ideas or maybe even taught you a thing or two that hadn't thought of before. That's all the space I have for this article, but I'll try to get another one up soon. See you then.