I'm making a character cake for my nephew and I want to place the cake on top of a square cake.

Should I cut a cake board the shape of the character pan and place it under the character cake, on top of the square one. Or should I just place the cake right on the square one without anything under besides the dowels?

I hope I was clear on what i'm saying

My motto: ALWAYS dowel if more than one tier!!! And yes - cut you a cardboard to fit your character pan - if not the cake will go thru the dowels! Or you'll be sorry when the weight of the top presses down on the bottom! ..
Good Luck!!

if character cake is just one layer then can place directly onto the sheet just like stacking two 2" layers to make a 4" tier (of course some BC in between as "glue" would be appropriate.)

dowels in bottom cake work ONLY if you have a cakeboard under the upper cake.

if you want character cake easily removable for separate serving, use the cakeboard and use dowels if you so choose (tho' for one layer not really necessary). You may want to cover underside of cakeboard w/ saran wrap, use a good crusting BC that has fully crusted on bottom square and even dust a little powdered sugar on BC under the character cake to minimize sticking.

Thank you!!