1. Determine Concept
2. Select Name
3. Assign Attributes
1. Assign Major Attribute
2. Assign Freebies
3. Assign Minor Attribute
4. Choose Bonus
4. Assign Drawback
5. Determine Secret
6. Calculate Hits
7. Experience Dice
8. Description
9. Draw the character

Determine Concept
This is the most important part of character creation, since everything else stems from it. Some important considerations are who your characters parent is, how old your character is, what he's been doing with his time and the like.

Example: Bill decides he wants to make a son of Gerard, a big strapping guy who knows his way around ships.

Choose a Name
This may seem like a simple matter, but in some ways, it defines the character as much as anything else. In this campaign, you are welcome to chose your own name, but if the GM selects it for you, it is worth extra experience.

Bill's pretty mercenary, so he let's the GM name his character to get the extra experience. The GM considers the sorts of names Gerard would pick, and chooses "Jacob".

Assign Attributes
Attributes are player defined terms that describe the character, and usually have a number of dice assigned to them.

Major Attribute
The major attribute is a word or short phrase that summarizes the central theme of the character. This word defines a number of the skills that the character will have in a very broad way. Some examples:

Ranger: Trained in Arden, the character is skilled at woodlore, hunting, tracking as well as moving stealthily through the woods. it also includes training in traditional ranger weaponry, including Sword, Knife, axe, bows and crossbows. It also may include a military position or rank of some sort.

Cat Burglar: Includes skills like moving about sneakily, breaking and entering, picking locks and other skills, including appropriate contacts in the characters home for dealing with and disposing of ill-gotten goods. The technical level of the burglar will depend on the characters background. (Note this is a bit more specialized thatn, say "thief." Broader groupings are possible, but the GM gets meaner in such cases.)

Select a major attribute and set it at 4 dice.

Example: Bill picks the main attribute "Sailor" describing it as a familiarity with most ships, navigation, naval warfare, and familiarity with traditional shipboard weapons. He also makes the case to the GM that it includes drinking and brawling, and the GM accepts it. On his sheet he writes down Sailor, 4 dice

Minor Attributes
Like Major Attributes, Minor Attributes are player-defined, but they are much narrower in focus. Some examples might include Street fighting, Sharp Eyes, Self Control, or Medicine. If a Minor Attribute includes anything but a single skill, or a small, tight group of skills, it's probably more appropriately a major skill. Most powers, such as sorcery or trump are minor attributes, but the selection of any such thing requires discussion with he GM.
Now, first off, you get some freebies for being a prince of Amber (non Amberites, talk to the GM for ways to balance this out). You receive, for free, the following attributes:

Strong, 5 dice
Resilient, 5 dice
Pattern, 2 dice

In addition, you get to assign two more minor attributes at 4 dice. If you wish, instead of assigning a new attribute, you may use the slot to add a die to any of the freebies. The player gets to chose two minor attributes. Write them down, and for most attributes, assign 4 dice to them. Certain highly specialized skills will have fewer dice, while more useless skills may have more. Your GM will be able to clarify this for you.

Bill writes down his freebies, then considers his options. As a son of Gerard he uses his first pick to add a die to Strength. Since he' playing a big strapping brute, he decides to have an ace up his sleeve, and picks "observant" as his second Attribute. So his sheet now looks like

Jacob, Son of Gerard
Sailor, 4 dice
Observant, 4 dice
Strong, 6 dice
Resilient, 5 Dice
Pattern, 2 dice

Assign Bonus
One chose skill gets to be improved even further. You simply add a die to the attribute of your choice. For some especially narrow or frivolous skills, the GM may allow a 2 die bonus rather than 1.

Bill thinks about it, and decides he really wants to play up the strength route, so he puts the bonus into Strong. He now has the attribute Strong, 7 dice! For reference, that mean's he's simply insanely strong.

Assign Drawback
This is an attribute, like all the others, except it's a negative trait, such as an enemy, and addiction, some physical or mental flaw, and unpleasant social trait, anything at all. The exact mechanic should be determined between you and the GM, but it will usually involve a penalty in certain types of situations.

So many possibilities. Bill's first instinct is to make him unimaginative, which seems to suit the big guy stereotype. Precisely because of that, he rejects it, and decides instead to go with "superstitious". The GM and he discuss it, and decide that he's easily swayed by omens, and that he takes a penalty die to actions that result in him violating any superstitious taboos. The GM doesn't make him define his SUperstitions now, trusting him to play it up as the opportunities arise. If William does not do so, things might go very badly for him indeed.

Determine Secret
Every character has a secret, something that would have dire consequences if it were to be revealed in public or to certain parties. If you are completely incapable of thinking of one, the GM will assign one, possibly that you don't know about, which will probably be nastier than anything you come up with.

Bill has a hard time with this, since Jacob's not a terribly sneaky guy. He considers a secret lover or wife. That would work, especially if it's someone the family would dislike, and who would make a convenient hostage. He decides he's secretly engaged to a former prostitute in Amber City, who he keeps living in fair style in town. The GM accepts this, because she not only has the potential to be a hostage, she might even turn out to be a spy or villain or the like. Or maybe just a traditional gold digger hoping to catch a prince. The GM and William hammer out a rough sketch of the lady in question, and all is set.

Calculate Hits
Hits are determined by picking any combat attribute, or a physical one relating to the state of the body, and either assigning 7 hits per die, or rolling two dice per die and adding it up. Most Amberites will have more than one possible choice, and in such cases, decide what to do with each one before rolling any dice, then pick the best.

William Looks at Jakob, and determines that Sailor(4d), Resilient(5d) and Strong (7d) all could give him hit points. With straight up math, Sailor would produce 28, Resilient 35, and Strong 49. William doesn't trust his luck with dice, so he accepts the 49 for Strong, and rolls dice for the other two. 8 dice for sailor produce 23, while 10 dice for Resilient produces 44. He sticks witht the 49.

Experience Dice
Every character begins with one experience die. This die may be used as a bonus die one time per adventure, provided you can come up with a good reason for it. Certain Activities will grant Experience Dice Bonuses, but more on that later.

William gets 1 experience Die for free. He also gets one for allowing the GM to select Jacob's name. He now has two experience dice, and talks with the GM about keeping quotes for the game in return for additional dice.

Description
Figuring out what the character looks like is also key. One element of this system is that in describing the character, certain key elements must be linked to all selected attributes, drawbacks and secret. These are small elements of the description that simply serve as lynchpins to hang other things off. Unless they have been improved upon, Strong and Resilient don't need descriptors, nor does pattern.

Bill looks at Jacob, and needs to come up with Descriptors for Sailor, Strong, Observant, Superstitious and Engaged. For Sailor, he opts for calloused hands. For strong, he chooses the obvious, large muscles. For observant, he chooses intelligent eyes. for superstitious, he selects his lucky rabbits foot, and for engaged, he selects a simple gold ring. Taking all these things into account, he describes Jacob as a huge, heavily muscular man in loose clothing with a shaved head and calloused hands with a gold ring on his right hand and surprisingly intelligent eyes. His rabbit's foot isn't always visible, but he takes it out to rub from time to time.

Draw the Character
Yes, this sucks. You hate it. Cope. This is a cast in stone absolute must. That being said, if you think it really sucks, don't show it to anyone, not even me. I trust you to do it, as long as you tell me you did it, and show me the piece of paper it's on really fast so I can get the impressions _something_'s on it.

Bill whines, pleads, begs and cajoles the GM, insisting that he can't draw to save his life. The GM doesn't care, and makes him draw anyway.