By now, you should have a pretty good idea how your character will end up. There are just a few more decisions before your PC is done.
You have several options for spending BPs at this stage:
Any remaing BPs are converted 1:1 into Karma Points. In general, it is better to spend as many of your BPs as possible during character creation; Karma Points are worthwhile only if you have a point or two 'left over' at the very end.
Over the course of a campaign, characters will accumulate Karma Points. These can be used to 'rewrite history' (changing the outcome of a previous post) or to ensure success on a given action. Karma Points are easiest to explain using examples:
Example 1: If you disagree with the results of a turn, you can spend a Karma Point to change things. For example, say your character is searching a ruin and is ambushed by a group of raiders, who gain total surprise. You feel that your character would not have caught unaware, since he was exploring very cautiously. You can spend a Karma Point to prevent the raiders from gaining surprise.
Example 2: A few rounds later, the same character is locked in mortal combat with the raiders. He is dangerously outnumbered and decides to spend a Karma Point - up front - to ensure a successful hit. In this case as GM I would probably allow the attack to result in an automatic critical. (You get more out of Karma Points if you spend them ahead of time rather than after the fact.)
One other thing that Karma Points can be used for is to decrease a character's Creep Count. Each Karma Point can get rid of a single point of Creep. See The Creep for more info.
Now that you've spent all your BPs, make final adjustments to attributes, skills, and so on based upon genotype, background, mutations, and talents. Record your base attack and defense bonuses, figure out your saving throws, and determine your overall skill adjustments. Then double-check the math!
(Don't worry if this is your first time using the d20 rules; I'll make sure everything adds up.)
Characters with an Intelligence bonus are eligible for bonus languages or literacy in addition to speaking your starting language (1 language per Int bonus point). Unislang is the 'common tongue' of Ground Zero; you should probably have a person or two in the party who speaks it. Gutterspeak is a degraded form of the Ancient tongue that is favoured by raiders and ruin-dwellers, and Tribal dialects abound in the wastes. (Gutterspeak and Tribal do not have written forms.) Knowledge of the Ancient tongue is a rare skill, but if your character already speaks several languages, I'll let him pick it up.
(At this time I will also secretly roll your starting Creep count.)
Your character will possess some rudimentary starting gear based on his background. In particular, decide on your weapons and armour. If your character starts with scavenged relics, I'll suggest useful items for you to pick from. If you want to possess any other miscellaneous gear, please let me know before the adventure begins.
Until proper equipment pages are available, you'll have to use the following armour and weapons tables:
Once everything is done, submit the information to me and I'll do up the character sheet. (If we've been able to arrange a meeting in person (or over the telephone) for character creation, then obviously this step is skipped!) I'll send you an e-mail once the PC is online.
If your mutant has sucky perks and punishing flaws, you might think that the PC is hopeless and that you should get to roll over. You can roll over - as soon as this character is dead and you're generating a new one. So rush to the fore in combat. Even if your character is so misbegotten that you never lay a point of damage on the enemy, you'll at least suck up some attacks that would otherwise hurt the characters that count. Pretty soon, you're on character number two.
It is improper, however, to roll up your next character first and use that to help you decide whether to kamikaze your current PC.