https://www.libreoffice.org/download/download-libreoffice/
All right, let's create some Palladium character sheets by hand, for free. While this tutorial is for Palladium Games, specifically Ninjas and Superspies, nothing is stopping you from doing this for D&D 5E, Pathfinder 2, GURPS, or any other game you can imagine. All we need are some free tools, like LibreOffice; grab it from the link above, or if you are on Linux, you probably already have it installed.
Why LibreOffice? Why Linux?
Because we are not supporting the AI ecosystem and are staying away from paid character hosting sites, software packages, and learning to be self-sufficient without spending money or having Microsoft feed our documents into AI models. My characters are my IP and thus mine. Also, I am not feeding into this RAM crisis. I choose not to use AI.
Also, my hand-crafted character sheets come out far better than these pretentious ones you get in the OSR and other games with dungeon maps and far too much clip art tossed all over them. They are simple, to the point, save paper and toner, and I can create custom sections to my liking if a game needs special information.
Download LibreOffice and install it. Then, go to Format->Page Style...
Set your margins to a half-inch, and give yourself a half-inch gutter. This way, we can three-hole punch our character sheets to store them in a binder with dividers. You may not want to know it now, but if you plan to run many characters or track one as they level, you will thank me later.
If you run an adventure, three-hole punch that too, and put the old character sheet in with it when you print a new one. This way, you will have a record of the adventure and the characters who went on it, and how they were at the time. Since you have hard drive space and these are small files, save a new file every time you level, just to watch the progression.
Next, go to Format->Columns and set this to two, and leave all the default values, including autowidth. This will use our paper better. Three columns are sometimes too hard to manage, and I end up with a lot of overflow onto the following line.
Part of me wonders if people need a tutorial like this, but another part of me knows that many just don't know. This is how we used to hack together character sheets in the 1990s, using word processors and dot-matrix printers, doing our own layouts and working magic with the features of the programs we had.
If you want an actual throwback, 1990s experience, doing your character sheets this way (or by hand) is the way to go. This is how we did them, and they always came out so clean, with plenty of room for notes and other scribbles. Did a value change? Cross it out, pencil in the new number, fix it later, and print a new sheet when you level up.
Remember to shred and recycle! But, seriously, doing my character sheets this way wastes a lot less paper than printing out a 16-page monstrosity with Hero Lab. One double-sided sheet can hold a lot of information when done this way. Of course, one sheet done by hand is the most waste-reducing way to make a character sheet, since you can use it until the holes wear through the paper. These sheets can do the same, as long as you pencil in new SDC and other changing values. I could do empty tables for "fill in by hand" parts, like for gear and open skill slots, and that is probably a smart improvement I can make to enhance reusability.
But it is my choice to make them! In many sheets and programs, you get no choice. This way, I get exactly what I want, and I can engineer re-use into the sheets if I feel I am wasting paper. I could go the whole way and make the entire sheet rigged for re-use, with a fill-in-the-blank box for everything.
For Ninjas and Superspies, I laid my first page out like above. The stats have tab stops, so I can create "columns" for the value and then the modifier. If a character has more than one martial art, copy and paste the Primary Form section for a new one. I made one since that is enough for now.
Skills and secondary skills will expand! Leave a lot of room at the bottom of a column for these expanding lists. In general, open lists will appear at the bottom of your page. Also, use the Insert -> More Breaks -> Insert Column Break command to stick a section at the top of a column, as I did for the weapon proficiencies. This way, they won't keep backing up into the skill lists.
Palladium has a lot of weapon modifiers that can add up for different weapons, so I split out the "to strike" modifiers for different weapon categories and include any bonuses from PP.
My second sheet has gear and, on the right, a list of the characteristics of different attacks. I have equipment back here, cyber implants, and a section for the training programs I selected during character generation, including the colleges the character attended and the time spent there. Cover is not on the official character sheet, but it improves as you level, so it needs its own section. Background is another fun section that covers family and other personal details. Remember to total your equipment weight!
If you need to set tab stops, you can do that by putting the cursor at the first spot in the document, choosing Format->Paragraph, and choosing the Tabs tab. Type in 0.5, press New, and then add them like that. I did mine every half inch.
If you want to get fancy, you can insert tables, too, and be very organized! I do everything with tab stops, but to each their own. If you like tables, go for it, and your sheets will begin to look very fancy. For games like Pathfinder 2, this may be a lifesaver feature. I will need to adjust column widths, and that is just a matter of dragging them over. Doing it this way gives me higher reusability, as previously discussed.
I like these hand-made character sheets a lot. They are more work, but this is a small trade-off for a sheet that grows as you fill it in, and you can create custom sections for whatever you want on the character. I can also copy & paste out of my PDFs into these, saving me a little work typing. If I need an entire spell description, I can create a sheet for it and paste that right onto the character's grimoire. If a character has an animal companion, I can make a place for their stats on the sheet.
If I want an adventure log, I can create a spot on the next sheet and list the adventure, the location, people involved, a summary of what happened, the XP gained, and other information.
Also, given the way you create characters in Palladium Games, you are copying and pasting a list of skills and modifiers into the sheet, making a few choices, and moving on to the next training package. For my character, I just added all the skills first with their modifiers, sorted the list, and removed the lowest-modified duplicates. Select a bunch of rows of text, and use Tools->Sort to sort that list so you can keep your skill and ability lists alphabetized for easier reference during play.
Would I love a Palladium software package and character designer? Yes, I would, and I know about the spreadsheet designers and have those for fantasy. But even those can't be as fine-tuned as this style of sheet, which is very personalized, and I can optimize the numbers I need and put them all in easy-to-read sections. The availability and quality of the character sheets I can find for the game do not limit the amount of fun I can have with it.
And my DIY sheets, while taking a little longer to set up, are fully customizable and quick to use during play. Are they fancy? No. Are they retro, and look like something we would do back in the 1990s with a 486 and a dot-matrix tractor-feed printer? Oh, yes! We did this for Spacemaster (with WordPerfect), and those sheets worked very well. All the same skills were used, including columns, bolded titles, and tab stops.
Now I don't need character creation software; I can do this myself on Linux. I am not feeding into the AI nightmare, and as a gamer, I can make the conscious choice not to feed into the AI bubble madness. I have the freedom to make that choice as a consumer.
Also, this throwback, 1990s-style word-processor sheet makes me happy.
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