I go through phases with which character set I'm playing, and whether it's a Steele I want to bother keeping — some exist only to try out new content or get a feel for a part of the game I usually don't mess with, but I do have three mains. The first Steele I ever played and still a favorite is a mischievous half-kaithrit smuggler who takes after Victor, with a love of thermal weapons and a penchant for eating things randomly to see what happens. He looks pretty wild by the end of one of his runs: vanae markings, the quartet wings morph of dove balm, naleen eyes and fangs, weird feet, and as many stat boosts as he could reasonably manage. He's been known to gulp down Nepeta or Humana+ until things settle down, just like dear old dad.
The other two are Khi (nickname), a hard half-leithan tech specialist that always ends up more of a dragon (a lot of Dracoguard), and Rion, a nice smuggler who starts as a half-kaithrit but becomes something of a sphynx morph by the end. (Cat-taur, six wings, full pelt, antlers, Flexible perk, long claws, mixed genitalia, and a changing color scheme that shifts from blonde/green at birth to silver/white/lavender by endgame.)
As for what makes them 'special,' aside from investing the time to decide what their personalities or views are aside from the basic three templates, I usually go for a combo of combat loadout and aesthetic. First smuggler uses whatever works but likes fire. Both Khi and Rion, the later Steeles, use the archery perks taught by Tanis but Khi combines it with the laser bow available from Carl later on for max perks, while Rion the sphynx kid uses all the smuggler ranged perks to just be a terror with the leithan bow for as long as possible. It changes the way I have to play the game with each of them, which abilities to go for based on what I'm fighting, and that gives each Steele's gameplay a unique feeling for me.
Out of my own curiosity, does anyone else play around with what 'opinions' their Steele would have of things in-game? Example, Victor's gambit and making their life something of a controlled glory show postmortem to his own legacy. A few lines of Chaurmine's dialogue made me notice it, when he's asking if you know what it feels like to have your life decided for you at birth. For mine, D thinks it's funny, Khi doesn't care and Rion hates it with a burning passion. Or maybe as a writing major I just get too into this stuff...
Thanks for opening up the thread, this was a fun exercise.