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Created an Ogre for the party to fight. One of the party had the tongues spell at the time and decided to talk it out with him. Through a series of difficult checks they convinced him they would provide food if he followed them. They kept providing food so he eventually became a npc with the party. The fun part was it was a Mythic game base so they were all becoming high level characters through strange and mysterious ways. At one point there was a statue that was supposed to grant a large Intelligence boost (+6) permanently. They told the ogre to touch it since they thought it was a trap and so he became a smart ogre. I had to essentially make him into a full fledged pc so long story short he now believes himself a king among men, wears extravagant clothes, and is attempting to start his own kingdom by "recruiting" people or creatures the party fights. Absolutely not what I expected but he is now one of my favorite characters
Also he hates fire because at one point they convinced him lava was food. He almost attacked them when he realized they had used him as a meat shield a couple times but instead realized that he was the one who acted on it regardless of who told him to.
I’ve “stolen” the old Toyota engineering term “5 whys” to explain critical aspects of my characters. Essentially you present something like: This character won’t ever drink healing potions. Then I ask why? Well because he thinks they make you weak. Okay why does he think that? Because his father taught him that. Why did his father teach him that? Because his father thought that would make him a strong warrior. Why did his father want him to be a strong warrior? Because he felt that his son wasn’t ready to take his place as his successor. Why didn’t his father think he was ready to become his successor? Because he wasn’t a cruel enough person. This line of questioning took a mundane if somewhat interesting aspect of a character and fleshed it out to become a backstory with an abusive and cruel father and a “I must make my dad proud” want that can be easily made into later character progression with a realisation of needing to be his own person.
I totally know what you mean. But at the same time Germindiamaican and Southafriwelshausscottikiwi are two of my favorite accents. Unfortunately the first was in a let's play episode I can't remember but for Southafriwelshausscottikiwi just look up the merchant from Resident Evil 4. Weird accents can be just great if they're consistently weird. I don't even know what you'd call hers but Nico from Devil May Cry 5 also has a bizarre accent and it's not a bad thing at all if you ask me. So on the positive side of messing up accents, you can make some great things lol
Agreed physical description is important! I play a 8' 6" goliath Paladin and I cant tell you how many times my size came into play DM: Creature grabs your cleric and crawls up a 10ft ladder destroying it before continuing down the passage. Me: Rokk (my goliath) runs upto where the ladder was and pulls himself up to the next floor continuing the chase DM: How? The ladder is gone..how would you clear 10ft? Me: Rokk is 8' 6"! With his wingspan he easily reaches 10ft! If you want I can roll athletics to lift myself up but with +5 str I bet you I got this. I....was also used as a stand for the smaller members to see over tall rocks.....and I couldn't wear 90% of the armor we looted cause I was too big...to make it worse the ~3-4' rogues stole my share of money after we sold it cause I'd hardly notice them...but thats what made it fun haha
7' 10" goliath fighter here, in the last campaign I played. I had a scene like that at one point, but with a whole lot of piercers clinging to the ten foot high roof of a ruined corridor. Me: "Yeah, so I'm just going to reach out directly in front of me and peel them off the roof as I go." DM: "One of them cracks open an eye as you approach, it's clearly unused to making horizontal eye contact with things it was about to try and ambush-predate. There's an awkward moment as your gazes meet." Me: "I make an 'I see what you were about to do there' face and slowly shake my head" DM: "It attempts to scurry toward you and half-heartedly drop onto any part of you." Me: "With its 5 foot move speed and falling from directly in front of my face? I let it fall all all of, like, five feet? And plink off the toe of my boot, unfazed" DM: "Pretty much. They're not very adaptable, as hunting strategies go."
I'm late but no matter. I at one point played a 14 Inch tall sociopathic sprite wizard and it was just so beautiful. He quite often made a habit of sitting on the paladin's shoulder and casting spells from there during combat
My tabaxi rouge was raised by goblins (she was abandoned as a child and a goblin tribe found and adopted her. They assumed she was some sort of pigmy bugbear) so she refers to all magic as ‘Booyag’ and keeps a pet rat. She knows how to ride wolves as well but that info hasn’t come up yet in the campaign
Heh, that'd be great, my wizard having a fear of horses while my barbarian cohort already has a fear of magic being used on him. "Why can't we just teleport?!" "Last time you nearly turned us into a totem pole with that tree! A horse is good enough!" We'd eventually compromise with me learning Phantom Chariot so I don't have to see the horses. And later I get excited discovering a mystery scroll, and develop a nervous tic when I learn it's Mount.
I have a wizard who is terrified of dragons because he was enslaved by one in his early adulthood. After his escape he developed PTSD, coming with nightmares and flashbacks. One time, our party was walking through a castle and we noticed some large footprints on the ground. After seeing that they looked similar to dragon prints, my wizard had a panic attack and was barely able to move for the next ten minutes. Turns out it was just bears.
One of my characters is a rogue who refuses to open doors outside of a town or city because during our first adventure I rolled low to check for traps and almost died. Now he checks for traps and then backs away so someone else can open it. This is regardless of if I roll a one or a 20. When asked why he says one to many doors tried to kill him. What do you think of that? (I’m fairly new to d&d and such and am trying to find out new ways to play my characters. )
I just started this video but before I forget, physical description is so damn important. One of my players is a changeling witch in Pathfinder and I've always assumed her to be this typical changeling, tall with long dark hair, pale skin, cold and commanding in presence. Her appearance never came much into play since she's not in her body in the campaign, but I was writing her a dream sequence outside of the sessions to drop some plot hints, and it occured me that I never asked her how she envisions her character's initial appearance. Turns out she's short, plump and has messy ginger hair. And warts. This literally destroyed my vision of her character. And just because I forgot to ask her how did she look before her current predicament.
Mavander I ran a game with an evil party where one player had a character with a hatred of shapeshifters because one killed his mother. Another person was playing a changeling... needless to say it did not end well. The changeling offered life using the golden hands stayed blade to reduce the assassin's hp to 1 but not kill him. He stuck to his character and attempted to attack anyways so she killed him. I liked how it added to the story and that he stuck with the character but the player who had the human assassin became quite upset afterwards and eventually dropped from the game after several attempts with a new character to enact revenge on the whole party for "picking a monster over him". I tried to let it go and thought he might get tired of failing as the entire party was high level so it would've taken a lot to kill them but eventually one of his plans backfired and a bounty was placed on his head by the authorities.
My Samurai's mannerism is that when ever he said his last name he would do a kind of arm movement and pose. Many NPCs in my GM's world picked up on this and would do this when addressing him when he would start to get a bigger name as a sign of respect towards him.
I play online, over roll20, and we don't use webcams (because we don't all have 1). But I still sit like my character, nod, and things like that, doing little things the character would do, even though no-one else can see it. I had a half-orc barabarian, and I'd sit right up, because he was nearly 7 foot, and, whenever he talked, I would stick out my lower jaw, and just talk, because pushing out my lower jaw made me talk in the gruff voice of the Half-Orc, and makes certain letters hard to pronounce, which it would be if you had tusks coming out of your mouth (but it bloody hurts after a couple minutes). When I played an older wizard, I hunched up a bit, squinted a bit, and otherwise just kind of end up embodying stuff my character would be doing, even though, again, no-one can see it. When the Half-Orc was sitting there during a long conversation I zoned out a little, and started looking around my room, because the character doesn't speak common perfectly, so after a few minutes of long discussion and big words, he kind of gave up trying to understand it all, and got bored.
I've only experienced pure fear in one game. A roll20 Aliens game where we're locked in a planetary base with a few xenomorphs. We had an actual interactive motion tracker and creepy music and I was generally terrified when that tracked started to show movement coming towards us
Having small mannerisms that your character invokes *constantly* gives you another tool; just once, not invoking it when you should. Maybe the wizard that compulsively twirls his wand snaps to attention and brandishes it unerringly when the villain threatens his family. A characteristically silent warrior bursts into a tirade at an otherwise unremarkable slight. Things like that.
My character was made to be the stereotypical mysterious character but because he was so well-liked and everyone had such unique interpretation of him that the DM made it canon that each person sees him differently
Cristiano Esteves sounds like a wizard I'm making who has a magical lute which sounds like a electric guitar. and with every spell he plays heavy metal.
I recently started to play a Gnome Artificer and one of his many weird details was that two of his fingers were replaced with metal prostheses. The problem was: they worked with magic and we started as prisoners in a cell were magic didn't work. So everytime I wanted to move these two fingers I would manually bend them with my other hand. The others at the table were amazed
Pain points have made for some very humorous play in one of the games I played in. My character had an intense hatred of goblins for having killed his mentor. During the second session, we went to a location that happened to be my character's home town, so the party went with him to visit his parents. He discovered that his parents had died, and their ghosts informed him that they were killed by goblins. This sends my character into a blind rage that leads him to the nearby cave where the goblins were hiding, and he kills all of them. Later, the party comes across a portal that leads us 500 years forward in time. We meet with the king in this new time, and he informs the party that my character is hailed as a hero for having cleansed the world of goblins during his life. That is how far just a simple detail like "hates goblins" can go for making the story and character more interesting.
Toast is super European, all of us eat it, when we colonised Australia and New Zealand they made fairy bread. Each country has their own different breads! Even the uk! Bread isn't just limited to bread bread too! Pastries count!
I had a Lawful Good paladin who was the up holder of everything he deemed good, but was very snobby and thought of himself as superior to others because of his "noble blood". Galathon (which was his name) was later saved by a beggar and then that made him think of peasants, as he liked to call everyone, as more important than just bodies. Later in the quest he failed a will save verses the God of Corruption, and became the new anti-paladin Cain. Started slaying everything around him. Just wanting to bring chaos and death in the name of his lord. Except for the beggars, because he remembered that the meager beggars once saved his life. Was one of my favorite characters and everyone enjoyed him watching him grow and become the demon of chaos that he had become
I never describe my experiance. I slave in 3d modelling software for hours (Sometimes days) to create my character accurately, with all marks, tattoos ad equipment included. I then rig and animate it also, so my character image can be updated as I progress.
I have a gnome bard who's missing her right eye. Everytime a person says they want to go through the door on the right eye, she always asks where that is.
"How do you create fear?" Crows. describe in Vivid detail a scene where there's a bunch of dead trees infested with crows that are eerily silent. describe how there's less color the world seems to be muted and mostly Grey
12:52 My Skyrim character is actually afraid of horses lmao. Though in reality I only made her that way because I don't like fast travelling (via carriage or using the map) and I want her to be able to interact with her follower.
I think what we have lost is the sense of complete immersion by cutting out those small details you just mentioned. The game felt more real in those older games for a reason.
I think it depends on the group to be honest. There are some groups where I don't get immersion, and others where I do. I know Skype certainly prevents deep immersion by virtue of a screen.
Another great video! I'm really glad you mentioned changing your character over time. In the last session, my wizard attempted to escape the police by creating a distraction and levitating away. He was swiftly disposed of by a squad of police via firing squad. I'm expecting that he'll probably have some fears of being out numbered by people with guys going forward. :)
Holy shit. Perfect excuse to wear a giant costume beard! Thanks for these wonderful ideas to help channel my character a little better during the game. I didn’t realize this is what I was missing!
So you are absolutely correct about the first one. One of the quirks that my party adored was the simple but unique description I gave of my character. Basically the character is a wood elf with an obviously strong build, a warrior build really though still androgynous looking, however they are towering over most other elves at 6’4” (highly unusual but I do make it clear this is supposed to be a family trait of theirs). The other part is that my character is wearing the uniform of their faction in contrast to all the rest of the elves around them. They carried three swords, only one that seemed magical and the mundane ones covered so their designs could not be made out. They also wore a choker with the symbol of their faction and long, bright red tassel earrings. The character has tan skin with the unique type of scars one can get from being struck by lightning running up their hands and up their arms. Their eyes are bright green. One of the features the players have all their characters still mess with is the last one. My character has thick, textured, wavy dark brown hair. It’s joked on often that my character has a lot of hair that is mostly untamable. The cleric, who often hitches a piggy back ride now from my character, will try to smooth and braid it as we travel along which my character allows. I also mentioned that there seems to be the odd ink stain occasionally that my character may not have noticed to clean off (my character is a researcher and artist and like most artists will find they have gotten paint or ink on themself and not remember why or how). Despite the fact that my character seems a bit wild like, I will mention that my character stands with a graceful and proper stance, not stiff but not so casual that it’s improper, often either a stoic expression or faint fond smile on their face. This part isn’t really known yet, and probably not suspected until I got my art commissioned for this character, but this character is also trans, sorta. Kinda nonbinary and using she/they. Still, started male physically and hasn’t really gone through the magical process to full transition and is in no rush since they are more NB than otherwise. This is to explain some aspects of their build which are…notably missing (flat chest, slightly broader shoulders that don’t slope the same way as women’s often do, and the Adam’s apple that is often covered by neck jewelry and high collars). Anyway the party latch on quickly to the bits and pieces of physical description I have provided for them regarding my character and I find it sweet that they are invested. Makes my day! Seriously though, we love to joke about the height my character has because they are the second tallest of the party which is sorta hilarious at times. Makes them pretty good at playing up being a “bodyguard” which we have done before. Oh and for 2 the party finds my character sketching or writing whenever they have a spare moment. When asked, the character has said they are writing reports or drawing or writing poetry, which they have. One of the players warned me that their character might steal one to see which I ok’d. 3) my character is friendly and fond but is pessimistic who tries to be optimistic. Their story is they are a parentified eldest child who eventually left home after the toxicity got too much. They are compulsively a protector and caretaker. They also have a past where they lost their fiancé during an incident which further reinforced their fear of losing what means most to them. The ongoing war in the continent does not help. And that leads into 4. They are, as said, compulsively a protecter and caretaker. They also fully blame themself for the lose of their fiancé and will take on far more responsibility for things than they should. This last one is one of the major character arcs I have planned for said character. I want them to learn to stop that or do so in a more reasonable manner. Also this character is one who’s story is about living with the grief of a loved one having passed on (kinda think of that film “Up” and I think you get the general idea though adapted for dnd). And desires 5, well that leads back to the grief. And also the parentified eldest child thing. Let’s start with eldest child. To start with, my pc has had little to call their own for a long time, including what interests they take and how they use their time. As such, they developed a desire to have something to call their own. One of the ways they started this is by leaving home and joining the faction they did. The other was having a relationship with their fiancé. And that leads into the next part. Their grief. The life plan that they had finally made for themselves is derailed entirely when their fiancé passes away. My pc cannot return to their toxic family and the incident has also alienated them from their fiancé’s family too. They have few friends, some who have stopped talking to them after they lashed out after the incident. So my character is left to pick themselves up on their own. So what do they do with that unmoored feeling? They throw themselves into their research, something their faction fully supports (scholars after all) and so they do that for 15 years as they try to figure themself out again and what they want. And that is simply, a life plan, with, in particular, a life plan that includes something they can call their own. I plan to have that be the party, what with being the found family thing, but we’ll see how that actually plays out still. It’s on track for now however. So basically my character wants purpose. Oh but there is one flawed desire they also have. Due to their survivor’s guilt they also have a small desire they refuse to acknowledge and that is to be “punished” for failing to protect their fiancé. They want someone or something to reinforce for them that the incident was entirely their fault. Is it? Absolutely not! This is not a healthy desire and that is part of the point. It’s a flaw designed for one of my pc’s biggest antagonist to dig into and manipulate my pc with. Namely, the ex brother-in-law who blames my pc for their sibling’s death. My pc believes them. Simple as that. Reminder that it isn’t supposed to be healthy, which is something of a theme in the campaign, which is to conquer these unhealthy mentalities and senses of guilt that we should not take responsibility on our shoulders for as they aren’t ours to carry or even have. And for fears, that goes back to the incident. Other than the fear of failure my character has and a fear of a lack of purpose, as well as a fear of loneliness, my character has a phobia of the creature that attacked and killed their fiancé. Simple as that. So yeah that’s how I made this character and I adore it! I love it so much ☺️ and I’m so glad you made their points because it reinforced for me that I made a character who is very investable for my party to play off of. Always encouraging! Thanks for the video!
This is great advice for fiction character writing in general. I have a 6'4" male character as one of my mains. That would affect his daily life for sure!
My character is a Elven ranger who hates nobles, as she was treated poorly when she was a maid. It makes her fearful and, that gives her a reason to join the rebellion in our story.
My favorite character I have played is also the most "lived in" and fleshed out character. He's not outright phobic of water but he gets real edgy and kind of snappy when around fast moving or deep water because he watched his older brother drown when he was a kid. He started out as a light hearted fellow but after some near death experiences and after his sister was kidnapped he kind of became a darker brooding type (lots of 1000 yard stares). But in combat he will risk his own life to save or protect his friends because he'll be damned if something bad is going to happen to those he cares about on his watch.
My favorite character was a young assassin that used certain alchemical...relaxation and anti anxiety aids. I even had him take a purge when he needed to sober up quickly. I laughed when the gm had my right arm cut off. I told the party that since I was a ninja my power had only increased through the maiming. Meanwhile my buddy who is a twink and can't help it was super salty because the dice weren't very kind to him that session. I was so into that character that I didn't care about failure. I didn't notice it when I failed as much as before and enjoyed myself more because of it.
For an example of description effecting how i played i had a human draconic bloodline sorceress, she was being hunted for plot reasons that ill not get into, so i in game got my hair dyed and cut as it was one of the ways i could think of throwing of would be assassins, i also started dressing in bardic style clothes and tried my best to pass off as a nobody bard, which... thanks to a really bad dm resulted in one of the players being force to betray me and then the dm pulling the big bad out of no where so all that work... down the toilet.
The best character I've ever played was a gnome midget. That wasn't just me being redundant. He was considered by other gnomes to be rather short, since he was 2'1". Since he was a wizard, the cantrip he most often used was Mage Hand. The spell he ended up using the most was Tenser's Floating Disk, since by standing on it he doubled his height with no real effect on his speed. He also was irrepressibly cheerful, even when he was about to die.
Is it ok for your character to have an odd hair/skin colour (example: white hair+extremely pale skin on a human who is quite young) if you can explain why this is the case?
That's between you and your GM. Just remember the consequences of that though - easily identifiable, marked as different. It's a great role-playing opportunity to be able to have to hide it when being chased, to have angst over the differences etc. It's a potential cool storytelling prop you can add to your character.
There is a genetic trait known as albinism, like if you were to see an albino crocodile. If you have albinism than your body is incapable of producing pigments that make up color so whoever has it is very pale, white hair, and grey eyes. Also a lot of people with albinism don’t have very great eyesight and have to wear glasses. And since i’m pretty sure glasses weren’t invented back then you should just try to make your character’s lowest stat perception
Just try to avoid RPing surprise stuff, talk about it with your DM beforehand. I tried to RP my character losing control when fighting a skeletal horse because my PC is afraid of them, but ended up ruining the session and everyone getting mad at me (and I deeply regret it)
I doubt you "ruined" the session, why do people think when they play a ROLEPLAYING GAME that everything will go according to some pre determined path? Thats dull. The environment should be flexible enough for characters to express themselves realistically
I had a Pain Point be a very good changer for a character who I picked up. He was a side-character made by a current player who was part of a Brother-Sister halfling duet, the sister was made by another player. The GM didn't like the idea of two cheeky halflings doing things so he had the girl uhh... forcefully entered to death by an ogre, this was the point where I picked the character up. He became a raging alcoholic, was intoxicated constantly which made my rolls harder, his primary stats were ridiculous though so it wasn't much of an issue, his party had the other abilities he couldn't use anyway. I stopped playing because I didn't have a way to get there anymore and my character was taken out, to come back as a Witch Hunter (The ogre was a witches pet.). Instead of using alcohol to numb himself he used his anger and heartbreak to fuel a sort of combat rage and went around hunting evil. Was a nice turning point and made it easy to pickup a character and gave me a lot of satisfaction in progressing his story.
Thanks for your video! It's nice to see a youtuber so involved with his community too. I appreciate how much I see your name in your comment section on both of your channels.
I did have a halfling bard who was rather happy go lucky, until his mother got kidnapped by slavers. Just in that short time he went from bard to assassin. That set up some rather interesting opportunities where he would be a bard to infiltrate someplace, and then his daggers came out to play when no one was looking. The first ones to feel the bite of his daggers was the slavers who had his mother. Really, really scary to see a halfling bard pull a blade and one shot your evil high marshall, then disappear before anyone was the wiser. And he was just the entertainment!
One of my favorite parts of my (recently deceased) Avariel was her fear of airships. She once lost a wing in battle (now had a prosthetic) and as a result of her struggles to find help and escape from the floating island she lost her wing on, she gained a terrible fear of falling and being unable to fly. Because airships were the main way to travel in that world, she would fly on them, but she refused to go indoors for more than a split second, lest the airship be shot out of the sky and she be unable to make it out and end up falling with it. She even refused to go inside when the party ran into a swarm of sky jellyfish, and the party ended up having to use Suggestion to keep her indoors until the jellyfish passed so they wouldn't kill her.
Just got into my first D&D group, my first ever game is happening on a couple of days, and I'm really nervous about roleplaying, but this video has helped me a lot. Thank you so much :')
Yes, yes, yes. Thank you very much. These really are covering some amazing territory here. World view is one of my first factors that I work on for a character. I've not specifically played with pain points, but I can see how some of my characters have had them on a certain level. But character goals... and even growth over the course of a game... those are both unbelievably helpful. Some of my favorite players have been ones that have grown and changed over the course of the game. One started out as the comic relief badass (as a point of reference, he was a flaming battlemage named Ruepaul), but by the end, the stress of his goal (which was actually to conquer a new homeland for his nation that had been turned into a magical wasteland) along with everything else that had been going on wound up transforming and developing the character. More recently, I've played a character that had an interesting mix of growth and lack of change. He was a very low wisdom character, but very good at what he did, which was bringing the pain with hellfire, despite being a very innocent young man, who dressed almost more like a priest than the warlock he was. What amused me the most was that he became a veritable Cassanova in the aftermath of saving a city from a cultist driven plague... despite still being very much dedicated to his God and goodness in general.
For the mannerisms bit, i once played a paladin who was basically an evangelical girl scout, and whenever she formally met someone new i reached out like i was going to shake the npc's hand irl It wound up earning us a bunch of allies! But it was just kinda taking advantage of an automatic gesture i had been taught The same paladin also wound up bonding a ton with our halfling who fools people into thinking they're a child, and they both had a great opportunity to reveal secrets, since she herself hides that she's a half-elf. I also have started having a thing with my aasimar being anxious about ruining their long feathery hair and it's led to a lot of fun weird workarounds and rp opportunities It's all about yes-and-ing to the campaign! Pick up on details and prop your character development up with it!
What do you do about players that just dont seem to care whatsoever about their character, not even their class or race? For context I have a player who when i asked what kind of character he was thinking of, he said simply "a knight". So i asked again, well, what kind. Theres always Fighter, tho we have a decent amount of dps as it is. But we do need a tank for the team. Maybe a Fighter, or even a Warpriest, to frontline? And his response was "no i dont want any of that, just make me a knight. medium armor and a greatsword." I have no idea what to say about it. I asked what kind of race, he said he didnt care. All he seems to care about is being able to mercilessly smash with a greatsword, and rp as a gentleman knight. Tried everything i could think of to get him involved. Eventually i literally made him a character and asked what he thought of it and the intended personality (idk if he wants a charismatic knight or a smashy knight), and he just said "sure, itll work" and no notes. Asked him if there was anything hed want to change, or add, or anything. Just got an "eh". I had actually made him a Barbarian Half Orc wth negative mental stats (20 point buy campaign) and really high physical stats who has a stature similar to lenny from Mice and Men. He means well and wishes for greater things and to help others, but he just cant help himself. He gets carried away, his Orcish blood boils a bit too thick. But in the end he has good intentions. This way he can smash, and hes semi tanky since Barbarians arent TOO bad at that. And beyond that RPing is up to him. Well, he decided to randomly throw in his only request: that his character be albino. Wasnt sure why, but ok. He's now albino. Aversion to fire and direct sunlight, as well as a slight bonus to disguise checks to pretend hes a burly, ugly elf. So I told him that as a gift, the town that knew of his good natured soul and his pesky condition decided to make him a patch cloak of pretty decent quality for him, to help with the sunlight. HE DIDNT UNDERSTAND WHY HE GOT A CLOAK, AND EVEN SASSED ME ABOUT IT. He had no intention of RPing the albino bit. He just wanted to say he was. And hes talking with all the info he the player has, and quickly and concisely some how, and has a casual, rolling accent and a self inserted charismatic attitude. And im just sitting here like IF YOU HAD WANTED TO BE A CHARISMATIC KNIGHT YOU SHOULDVE SAID SO INSTEAD OF REPEATEDLY SAYING GIBBERISH, I COULDVE MADE YOU A TACTICIAN FIGHTER SO YOURE MORE ABOUT THE CARE OF THE TEAM AND THE UPSTANDING NATURE OF YOUR LAWFULNESS. INSTEAD OF A CG HALF ORC BARBARIAN WITH NEG MENTALS. So i just dont know what to do. Maybe you can give me some ideas. All my other characters are super into their guys. I got a Human Gunslinger who has dreams of becoming a merchant and mass producing firearms for the country, seeing as how the world is relatively gunless. He wishes to fix that and be a gun toting mogul. I have a Human Bard whos actually female being played by a male character who has actually committed to the RP of being a woman who wishes to make herself and her compatriots world famous and to get as many people as humanly possible to know and respect their names. I have a Human and an Elf (two players) who are both Bladebound Magus who taught under the same master who wish to track down the ancient, lost arcane secrets in the world, albeit for VERY different reasons. The Human is negligent to fight, preferring his studies and his books greatly. He sacrificed his martial training a bit for an extensive array of research and studies and has become a veritable swiss army knife of a man. He wishes to track down the lost arcanes for the potential they posses and for the utilities they could provide. Then the Elf is more combat prowess than book smart. He left the library a bit more than hes proud of to practice with his blade in the yard. Hes a brilliant fighter with a dedicated heart towards his goals. He seeks the lost arcanes for the practical uses it could provide, as well as the raw power is no doubt holds for him. So I have all these interesting characters with players going all in for it, and then this other guy. Literally didnt make his guy because he didnt care enough to even tell me a play style, and is now RPing a completely different being from what i made for him. Any thoughts?
He must be more interesting in the mechanics than the roleplay. There's absolutely nothing wrong with that, but it is frustrating to have a mechanics gamer in a role playing game or a role player in a mechanics game. Why don't you ask him about it. Without saying that he is playing the game wrong(because he isn't, just a different way), ask him if you can help him with his character and roleplaying. Tell him that this is a roleplaying group and that if you going to not roleplay then you might want an explanation for it. Like what if he's a construct made by the wizard of the party to help them in the journey, that way he doesn't have to roleplay, or maybe he's just very stoic and mysterious. I know that it might be hard to do this after you have already started, but you get the idea. And he's not ok with doing something like that, then don't push it. Unless he is ruining the experience for the other players, he can play however he wants. But if he is running the experience for the other players, then tell him that he does need to do something about it
My lizardfolk rogue is 4ft tall and 78 lbs so he rides on his goliath companion's shoulders. He's also slowly building a relationship with the Titan bard in the party. He doesn't want to admit it but he likes when the bard plays the songs of his people. Slowly he's starting to act more friendly. And pats his companion on the back whenever his performance goes otherwise upraised.
One thing that could work is maybe have the character be allergic to a certain thing (or some other kind of involuntary reaction). Probably not so sever that they'd go into anaphylactic shock in the middle of an adventure but something that might hamper them or at least cause them to have to make choices. Healing potions cause them to break out in hives, or gnolls make her sneeze, or a particular type of alien has weird reactions happen to them in systems with a particular type of star (oh wait that's Superman. Anyway!). Obviously something a player would have to work out with their GM, but could be interesting for the right kind of group.
Starting the carrion Crown in a few days and since i had my character have siblings and a living parent in a location within the campaign I had to write up bios for 3 siblings and mother, then threw in my vision of the family tavern including what roles each family member filled. It really helped me get a better understanding of my character! I just have to hope my DM doesn't have an issue with me essentially creating the layout of a building in her campaign
6) Phobias & Fears: In Neverwinter Online; There's a Fire Giant that finds "small folk" off putting, and has issues with a really big bird. I wonder...
One of the first things I like to make sure I know is why in the world would my character leave home on adventure, and boy has it been a hard question sometimes! One of mine left home because his teacher is sick and he's looking for a rare herb to cure her, one was born in prison and wants to see all of the natural world, and a pair simply are seeking the ultimate thrill and true glory. It usually really helps me nail down a general personality and goals!
I needed this. I made a Dwarf fighter and gave him a backstory but didn't know how to play him at the table and how he would interact, leaving me often silent in social situations, maybe this will help, thanks.
I have a character in waiting that is a halfling teen who's a spitfire and slightly obnoxious, but utterly terrified of pigs. Anything that is pig like reminds her of the giant ( to her) hogs on her father's farm and she panics
My character has a fear of crowds :3 And that's actually a disadvantage picked in the character creation .. In order to get advantages you have to pay them with disadvantages xD
I had a character who was an alchemist/witch, she ended up with this disease that was connected to the dream realm. so she went to a mage doctor looking for a cure. he only had a recipe that would extend her life to a year rather than the 6 months she had without it. he provided her with the recipe, and one of the ingredients was Ectoplasm. while at the mage's college, she went looking for the ingredients and ran into a teacher, that turned out to be a lich, who had it. the teacher said she would trade the ectoplasm for some blood. well to put it bluntly DM had her clone my character, then had me play the clone, without me knowing, and I didn't find out about it until we were sucked into the dream realm, and there were two of me. needless to say the clone alchemist/witch developed a fear of being killed off by the original and would panic anytime we were in the same room.
We have a player who has a pain point, it's called "The Hill Dwarf Cleric in a small, low level party that wants to take on the Storm Giant and his small army."
The fears bit can be especially interesting for the character. For instance, my first character in a game of Deadlands: Reloaded was a Metal Mage, but, because i limited him to only being able to control metal in a solid state, he had a paralyzing fear of mercury, because it made him feel powerless. When that character died and his soul transferred into my new character (long story), the new character kept that fear of mercury, though it was no longer paralyzing, but he also gained a fear of the demonic trees that killed the first character twice over. Later on, my DM used that fear of the demon trees to hinder my new character's progress while he was travelling through Hell. Before anyone asks, no, Hell and demon trees are not normal things to find in Deadlands. My DM is just a crazy person.
My current character is a former town guard with a dislike of the upper class, who is the only nonviolent member of an incredibly murderous group (I'm a Neutral Good character in an entirely Chaotic Evil and Chaotic Neutral party). Instead of character progression, he is regressing to become more like them - the people he initially had a "What am I DOING with this lot?" view of. At some point in the future, he's going to realize this is completely against his ideals and retire, and let the adopted Gnoll son he was forcefully given by the party take his place. Best character I've ever played.
My current favorite character is a Necromancer, but she's like the polar opposite of your stereotypical necromancer. She's shy and bookwormish, wears a big blue sweater and tiny reading glasses. She's studying necromancy because she's fascinated by ghosts after being possessed by one. She's also wholesome and endearing, despite being very antisocial. Easily some of the most fun I've had roleplaying.
My character is in no way a Druid (she’s a Bard) but she despises when people harm nature. And whenever she might kill a wild animal (probably for necessary food) she will always thank it for its sacrifice. It’s probably good to mention that I haven’t ever played her yet, but I am working very hard on her.
My character (a half orc witch named Balor la Fleur) was scarred physically and mentally by his mother and her court of noblewomen. Because of this, he hides his pain and fear behind pride and rudeness; although internally he is terrified of people telling him what to do; as he feels like he'll lose the freedom he fought so hard to achieve.
My character loves people, all she wants is to be surrounded. Even so, she's a tiefling, and she doesn't realise that some people will always hate her. She is confident she can overcome her tiefling stereotype, ans so her growth is learning that some people in her world are cruel, and that some people will not like her, and that she must overcome the Naïve perspective that everyone can be good
Talking of mannerisms... I have rudisms. If anyone trips, falls over, or gets hurt for ANY reason, I immedately ask "are you dead? Got any gold?" Too bad that the first two deaths were by Tarrasque and there WAS no gold to loot. Because if there was.... I'd have a few more gp.
Pain points? Gnome racist. We have a Gnomish Cleric- I barely tolerate him in the party. He tries to heal me, I'll resist the spell or even go so far as to stab myself to refuse his help. Fear? Dragons. In backstory, he was nearly (unintentionally) sacrificed to a dragon to a brutal death: This expierience scarred the Kobold, and even brings a strange sort of hypocritical stance to him, as Ominak is f***ing terrified of dragons but is super prideful of his draconic heritage, only further inflating his ego that he is Dragonwrought, and he loves anything dragon themed.
As for physical description... Because being a Dragonwrought Kobold means I'll get wings, and my (basically) best friend is a Dragonborn, we thought of an idea using my character's stature: Tie a spear to my back, chuck me as I open my wings, AND BECOME THE WORLD'S FIRST HOMING MISSLE!
You say that we don't see change in roll playing, but I always try to include character development within my characters. One such character was one named Rachel, who was a rogue that became an assassin for the soul purpose of killing those who would harm innocent people, but as time progressed she realized this was still murder, and that there is no way to truly get rid of this dilemma. Because of this she stopped being an assassin and instead ended up becoming a diplomat for a country to use her passionate beliefs within an environment that could gain allies for the people she cared about, changing her entire outlook.
Bacon Battalion RPG ah, that makes sense. Personally having a character change throughout the story normally makes it more fun and interesting for me, and usually other people, especially the gm
my sea trog is very mild mannered due to isolation in exile and is always slightly begrudging to get into dangerous environments because he was forced physically to join the adventure on threat of death
My elf has been among humans so much that he's "give native" and lost touch with his elven roots; his arch is going to be reconnecting and re-establishing that connection to his Elven haraitige, where he'll stop acting as "pragmatic" and start getting a sense of wonder and etherealness to his tone.
I once had a character who was a Druish princess - a halfling druid with a to thick Brooklyn accent. Lol I think the party secretly voted to have her killed.Oy vey!
We actually had something come up where my tortle weighed too much for a party member to carry but my legs were broken. It became a huge role play encounter that the group really enjoyed.
Really like this video, helps me improve on my current character. He started as a lv1 Dwarf Cleric with a great fear of the undead, cuz when he was young, his home was overrun with hordes of undead, but his parents sacrificed themselves to save him and his sister. He then later on wanted to work as a cleric as a way to banish and protect himself and those around him, his fear was still there, which he didn't like, he wanted to go out and experience the world to try to combat this fear, help more people, make the world a better place. Now, he's currently lv5 (lv3 Cleric, lv2Wizard) and he's dabbling into necromancy as a way to overcome his fear and instead use it's power against itself. But to keep him interesting, he's now starting to develop a fear of corrupting himself with the dark arts, he needs to balance the light and darkness, he's getting thoughts about him rising as a lich and a tyrant and ultimately becoming what he once feared the most.
@13:00 comic relief fears... You mean like your starfinder medic screaming at the SPOILERS: mutated electrovore after trying to play dead?🤣💗 That was gold, pure, solid, 24k gold. Thank you I almost fell off my chair that time
My character Brook has a few phobias. First of all, she can't understand religion because she grew up in an irreligious community who only rever the forest they hunt in (because at least they can see that), and she also fears it because it is well known in most shifter communities that an order religious fanatics of elves and humans tried to wipe out her race on multiple occasions. So whenever she meets clerics or paladins or the like, her reactions range from mild contempt to open hostility. For the aforementioned reason she is also pretty xenophobic and takes a long time to trust anyone, especially of a different race, but once she bonds, she bonds for life. She also doesn't like books because, well, she can't read, and also because she fears the power that they can have over people. I assume things will get pretty interesting because my DM has confirmed that in her world, the gods are real and will likely play a big part in the late game, so I'm actually excited to see how she'll react to seeing her own power so utterly dwarved by something she didn't even believe existed. She has already had a little taste of that when she was actually killed by a Lich in the early game, but inexplicably woke up in the field before the temple with only the scars of wounds that were lethal, dotted all over her body as a reminder. This has understandably upset her quite a bit, since, if there is no such thing as higher powers, or an afterlife, how come she is still alive and even remembers a conversation she had with the ghost of someone in her past? To be honest, I'm thrilled to see where my DM takes this, character plots are always the best plots in my opinion:D
Ashka just wants to see the world, he wants to get away from the structure of the nest and be free. So he runs. He runs away from the nest into the Wild, trains with weapons, shortbows, shortswords, meets a... new friend. Rides into combat on his new friend. Ashka- Kobold, Ranger, Tamer of Pteradons.
When my first PC started the DND campaign, she was a wide eye bushy tailed vain wizard with a fear of thunderstorms and lightning. By the end of the campaign she had persuaded a noble that she was a cortisan to get access to the secrets of litchdom, committed genocide, and saw herself as basically a goddess made flesh. All with a very stupid accent.
i have a lawful Evil oathbreaker, trying to replace the ruler in his homeland with someone he chooses, because he was betrayed and they had his brother killed after framing him.. so now he burns for Revenge, but planning on making him less so depending on the story and the situations that arise, if things goes even more to shit, I might fall lower, maybe multiclass into wizard and pick up necromancy or do Warlock. he is 1 lvl warlock and 4 paladin, Maybe give him to the DM to use as a minor villain if things go to much south.. If it becomes better and he achieve some of his goals he might pick up idk, Bard? but he will always have his dark tendencies but in a lighter way. also has fear of open fire, because he started worshipping Sargonnas after his mind became weak, and became sort of brainwashed from his madness after he found his brother dead. (who was my first character ever, im fairly new to d&d and got bored wtih my character).
Pain points is a great one. I made a LE character who was a sociopath, but their one main point of empathy was someone losing a loved one. They had lost a loved one in their past, which ended up with them becoming an assassin and losing their regard for human life. They still have the ability to care for others (hence how a LE character works well in a party), but it’s very slow to develop with the one exception of having empathy towards that one specific exception.
In a steampunk RPG I'm going to start soon, I'll be playing an acrobatic, swashbuckling bounty hunter who's very cynical and jaded because he grew up in a horrible neighborhood; but he still has a soft spot for people in need because he knew what it was like to need someone to rely on. What kind of fears should I give him? Side note; he's really small for a human man, roughly 5' 3", and he has a thing for rope swinging. Not only is he not bothered by people making comments about his height, but he's found ways to use it to his advantage. At least, that's what I'm going with in my head.
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Created an Ogre for the party to fight. One of the party had the tongues spell at the time and decided to talk it out with him. Through a series of difficult checks they convinced him they would provide food if he followed them. They kept providing food so he eventually became a npc with the party. The fun part was it was a Mythic game base so they were all becoming high level characters through strange and mysterious ways. At one point there was a statue that was supposed to grant a large Intelligence boost (+6) permanently. They told the ogre to touch it since they thought it was a trap and so he became a smart ogre. I had to essentially make him into a full fledged pc so long story short he now believes himself a king among men, wears extravagant clothes, and is attempting to start his own kingdom by "recruiting" people or creatures the party fights.
Absolutely not what I expected but he is now one of my favorite characters
Also he hates fire because at one point they convinced him lava was food. He almost attacked them when he realized they had used him as a meat shield a couple times but instead realized that he was the one who acted on it regardless of who told him to.
This is an actual character. Almost like a “flowers for algernon” ogre. Love it!
Only in dnd, amirite?
My character, Dumplin', started chaotic evil and ending chaotic good. We called it "the redumption arc."
As in the one and only Demon God Dumplin' ?
Beautiful
Is that a mf TFS reference?
So basically like Discord from MLP FIM?
I’ve “stolen” the old Toyota engineering term “5 whys” to explain critical aspects of my characters. Essentially you present something like: This character won’t ever drink healing potions. Then I ask why? Well because he thinks they make you weak. Okay why does he think that? Because his father taught him that. Why did his father teach him that? Because his father thought that would make him a strong warrior. Why did his father want him to be a strong warrior? Because he felt that his son wasn’t ready to take his place as his successor. Why didn’t his father think he was ready to become his successor? Because he wasn’t a cruel enough person. This line of questioning took a mundane if somewhat interesting aspect of a character and fleshed it out to become a backstory with an abusive and cruel father and a “I must make my dad proud” want that can be easily made into later character progression with a realisation of needing to be his own person.
ooh that’s an interesting technique! I might try it since my new oc feels a bit bland
Ahhh accents the bane of existence's. fading in out of british, then to welsh, then to some sort of Australian then to scottish
Then to french
Then jamaican
Then the whole party is confused
I totally know what you mean. But at the same time Germindiamaican and Southafriwelshausscottikiwi are two of my favorite accents. Unfortunately the first was in a let's play episode I can't remember but for Southafriwelshausscottikiwi just look up the merchant from Resident Evil 4. Weird accents can be just great if they're consistently weird.
I don't even know what you'd call hers but Nico from Devil May Cry 5 also has a bizarre accent and it's not a bad thing at all if you ask me.
So on the positive side of messing up accents, you can make some great things lol
Me; all my characters have cool accents
Me: butchering the accents horribly
I do this when talking normally
did we play together? lmao
Agreed physical description is important! I play a 8' 6" goliath Paladin and I cant tell you how many times my size came into play
DM: Creature grabs your cleric and crawls up a 10ft ladder destroying it before continuing down the passage.
Me: Rokk (my goliath) runs upto where the ladder was and pulls himself up to the next floor continuing the chase
DM: How? The ladder is gone..how would you clear 10ft?
Me: Rokk is 8' 6"! With his wingspan he easily reaches 10ft! If you want I can roll athletics to lift myself up but with +5 str I bet you I got this.
I....was also used as a stand for the smaller members to see over tall rocks.....and I couldn't wear 90% of the armor we looted cause I was too big...to make it worse the ~3-4' rogues stole my share of money after we sold it cause I'd hardly notice them...but thats what made it fun haha
Aww it actually hurt my heart that your group stole your money! Lmao
Rokk sounds lovable, curse all who dare steal from him!
6'6" dragonborn here...his friend is a 3' gnome that likes sitting on his shoulder. Without height description, this wouldn't be possible.
7' 10" goliath fighter here, in the last campaign I played. I had a scene like that at one point, but with a whole lot of piercers clinging to the ten foot high roof of a ruined corridor.
Me: "Yeah, so I'm just going to reach out directly in front of me and peel them off the roof as I go."
DM: "One of them cracks open an eye as you approach, it's clearly unused to making horizontal eye contact with things it was about to try and ambush-predate. There's an awkward moment as your gazes meet."
Me: "I make an 'I see what you were about to do there' face and slowly shake my head"
DM: "It attempts to scurry toward you and half-heartedly drop onto any part of you."
Me: "With its 5 foot move speed and falling from directly in front of my face? I let it fall all all of, like, five feet? And plink off the toe of my boot, unfazed"
DM: "Pretty much. They're not very adaptable, as hunting strategies go."
I'm late but no matter. I at one point played a 14 Inch tall sociopathic sprite wizard and it was just so beautiful. He quite often made a habit of sitting on the paladin's shoulder and casting spells from there during combat
0:35 Physical description
2:48 Mannerisms
5:00 World view
6:35 Pain points
9:05 Desires
10:48 Phobias
Thanks XD
Thanks on a guys hip
My tabaxi rouge was raised by goblins (she was abandoned as a child and a goblin tribe found and adopted her. They assumed she was some sort of pigmy bugbear) so she refers to all magic as ‘Booyag’ and keeps a pet rat. She knows how to ride wolves as well but that info hasn’t come up yet in the campaign
Heh, that'd be great, my wizard having a fear of horses while my barbarian cohort already has a fear of magic being used on him. "Why can't we just teleport?!" "Last time you nearly turned us into a totem pole with that tree! A horse is good enough!" We'd eventually compromise with me learning Phantom Chariot so I don't have to see the horses. And later I get excited discovering a mystery scroll, and develop a nervous tic when I learn it's Mount.
I have a wizard who is terrified of dragons because he was enslaved by one in his early adulthood. After his escape he developed PTSD, coming with nightmares and flashbacks. One time, our party was walking through a castle and we noticed some large footprints on the ground. After seeing that they looked similar to dragon prints, my wizard had a panic attack and was barely able to move for the next ten minutes. Turns out it was just bears.
One of my characters is a rogue who refuses to open doors outside of a town or city because during our first adventure I rolled low to check for traps and almost died. Now he checks for traps and then backs away so someone else can open it. This is regardless of if I roll a one or a 20. When asked why he says one to many doors tried to kill him.
What do you think of that? (I’m fairly new to d&d and such and am trying to find out new ways to play my characters. )
Its nice!
It makes perfect sense
@@matthewdeleon382 thanks. Sadly I haven’t been able to play him in a long while.
I just started this video but before I forget, physical description is so damn important. One of my players is a changeling witch in Pathfinder and I've always assumed her to be this typical changeling, tall with long dark hair, pale skin, cold and commanding in presence. Her appearance never came much into play since she's not in her body in the campaign, but I was writing her a dream sequence outside of the sessions to drop some plot hints, and it occured me that I never asked her how she envisions her character's initial appearance. Turns out she's short, plump and has messy ginger hair. And warts. This literally destroyed my vision of her character. And just because I forgot to ask her how did she look before her current predicament.
Mavander I ran a game with an evil party where one player had a character with a hatred of shapeshifters because one killed his mother. Another person was playing a changeling... needless to say it did not end well. The changeling offered life using the golden hands stayed blade to reduce the assassin's hp to 1 but not kill him. He stuck to his character and attempted to attack anyways so she killed him.
I liked how it added to the story and that he stuck with the character but the player who had the human assassin became quite upset afterwards and eventually dropped from the game after several attempts with a new character to enact revenge on the whole party for "picking a monster over him". I tried to let it go and thought he might get tired of failing as the entire party was high level so it would've taken a lot to kill them but eventually one of his plans backfired and a bounty was placed on his head by the authorities.
My Samurai's mannerism is that when ever he said his last name he would do a kind of arm movement and pose. Many NPCs in my GM's world picked up on this and would do this when addressing him when he would start to get a bigger name as a sign of respect towards him.
That's nice
Okay, now to make my character that is afraid of the word "and."
LOL
and dont forget and and nand are quiet common however nand is rarer than and and things can get quiet wierd and strange when and and nand are unusable
No more "Yes, and..." Only "yes"
I just sat here for thirty minutes trying to make a Monty Python reference, but I couldn't make it fit.
Oh! I said it!
Oh god, I said it again!
Oh-!
And and and and and and and and and and and and and
I play online, over roll20, and we don't use webcams (because we don't all have 1). But I still sit like my character, nod, and things like that, doing little things the character would do, even though no-one else can see it. I had a half-orc barabarian, and I'd sit right up, because he was nearly 7 foot, and, whenever he talked, I would stick out my lower jaw, and just talk, because pushing out my lower jaw made me talk in the gruff voice of the Half-Orc, and makes certain letters hard to pronounce, which it would be if you had tusks coming out of your mouth (but it bloody hurts after a couple minutes). When I played an older wizard, I hunched up a bit, squinted a bit, and otherwise just kind of end up embodying stuff my character would be doing, even though, again, no-one can see it. When the Half-Orc was sitting there during a long conversation I zoned out a little, and started looking around my room, because the character doesn't speak common perfectly, so after a few minutes of long discussion and big words, he kind of gave up trying to understand it all, and got bored.
The pushing lower jaw out trick kinda works for me. But is also makes me speak in a very, VERY British accent. So that's cool, I guess.
and that my friends, is what i presume voice actors do in the recording booth.
I've only experienced pure fear in one game. A roll20 Aliens game where we're locked in a planetary base with a few xenomorphs. We had an actual interactive motion tracker and creepy music and I was generally terrified when that tracked started to show movement coming towards us
Having small mannerisms that your character invokes *constantly* gives you another tool; just once, not invoking it when you should. Maybe the wizard that compulsively twirls his wand snaps to attention and brandishes it unerringly when the villain threatens his family. A characteristically silent warrior bursts into a tirade at an otherwise unremarkable slight. Things like that.
My character was made to be the stereotypical mysterious character but because he was so well-liked and everyone had such unique interpretation of him that the DM made it canon that each person sees him differently
My main problem with this is the fact that I’m too indecisive on my character’s backstory.
Could you do a video about how to effectively utilize familiars/animal companions in combat and story?
I actually do art of my characters to have a picture of them.
My dragonborn bard is going to adventure to get money and wealth to start his own bard college to spread the rock and roll through the land!
Totally! Awesome!
Cristiano Esteves sounds like a wizard I'm making who has a magical lute which sounds like a electric guitar. and with every spell he plays heavy metal.
dave mustaine???is that you?
A noble cause, if there ever was one!
He's gonna make his own Bard College, and it's gonna have bone dice, and dancers!
On physical appearances: My party adopted a direwolf NPC, but we can only take him inside a building or room if the place has double doors.
I recently started to play a Gnome Artificer and one of his many weird details was that two of his fingers were replaced with metal prostheses. The problem was: they worked with magic and we started as prisoners in a cell were magic didn't work. So everytime I wanted to move these two fingers I would manually bend them with my other hand. The others at the table were amazed
Pain points have made for some very humorous play in one of the games I played in. My character had an intense hatred of goblins for having killed his mentor. During the second session, we went to a location that happened to be my character's home town, so the party went with him to visit his parents. He discovered that his parents had died, and their ghosts informed him that they were killed by goblins. This sends my character into a blind rage that leads him to the nearby cave where the goblins were hiding, and he kills all of them. Later, the party comes across a portal that leads us 500 years forward in time. We meet with the king in this new time, and he informs the party that my character is hailed as a hero for having cleansed the world of goblins during his life.
That is how far just a simple detail like "hates goblins" can go for making the story and character more interesting.
Goblin Slayer huh... Souka
Fun fact about roleplaying with middle-europeans... You always have a toast. Toast-speeches included.
A what?
Toast is super European, all of us eat it, when we colonised Australia and New Zealand they made fairy bread. Each country has their own different breads! Even the uk! Bread isn't just limited to bread bread too! Pastries count!
aelin playing sims I think they were talking about toasting drinks.
@@epileum67 I think they were making a joke
Gwynn I know, I was just clarifying that I thought the OP was referring to toasting drinks
I had a Lawful Good paladin who was the up holder of everything he deemed good, but was very snobby and thought of himself as superior to others because of his "noble blood". Galathon (which was his name) was later saved by a beggar and then that made him think of peasants, as he liked to call everyone, as more important than just bodies. Later in the quest he failed a will save verses the God of Corruption, and became the new anti-paladin Cain. Started slaying everything around him. Just wanting to bring chaos and death in the name of his lord. Except for the beggars, because he remembered that the meager beggars once saved his life. Was one of my favorite characters and everyone enjoyed him watching him grow and become the demon of chaos that he had become
I never describe my experiance.
I slave in 3d modelling software for hours (Sometimes days) to create my character accurately, with all marks, tattoos ad equipment included.
I then rig and animate it also, so my character image can be updated as I progress.
I've always wanted to do that. What program do you use
Probably blender or maya
I have a gnome bard who's missing her right eye. Everytime a person says they want to go through the door on the right eye, she always asks where that is.
EPIC!
"How do you create fear?"
Crows.
describe in Vivid detail a scene where there's a bunch of dead trees infested with crows that are eerily silent.
describe how there's less color the world seems to be muted and mostly Grey
12:52 My Skyrim character is actually afraid of horses lmao. Though in reality I only made her that way because I don't like fast travelling (via carriage or using the map) and I want her to be able to interact with her follower.
I think what we have lost is the sense of complete immersion by cutting out those small details you just mentioned. The game felt more real in those older games for a reason.
I think it depends on the group to be honest. There are some groups where I don't get immersion, and others where I do. I know Skype certainly prevents deep immersion by virtue of a screen.
I remember in a one shot the fact that my Tabaxi didn’t wear shoes became important
Another great video! I'm really glad you mentioned changing your character over time. In the last session, my wizard attempted to escape the police by creating a distraction and levitating away. He was swiftly disposed of by a squad of police via firing squad. I'm expecting that he'll probably have some fears of being out numbered by people with guys going forward. :)
That's a good example of how the character can evolve and feel more real! Sounds like a fun campaign!
Holy shit. Perfect excuse to wear a giant costume beard! Thanks for these wonderful ideas to help channel my character a little better during the game. I didn’t realize this is what I was missing!
So you are absolutely correct about the first one. One of the quirks that my party adored was the simple but unique description I gave of my character. Basically the character is a wood elf with an obviously strong build, a warrior build really though still androgynous looking, however they are towering over most other elves at 6’4” (highly unusual but I do make it clear this is supposed to be a family trait of theirs). The other part is that my character is wearing the uniform of their faction in contrast to all the rest of the elves around them. They carried three swords, only one that seemed magical and the mundane ones covered so their designs could not be made out. They also wore a choker with the symbol of their faction and long, bright red tassel earrings. The character has tan skin with the unique type of scars one can get from being struck by lightning running up their hands and up their arms. Their eyes are bright green. One of the features the players have all their characters still mess with is the last one. My character has thick, textured, wavy dark brown hair. It’s joked on often that my character has a lot of hair that is mostly untamable. The cleric, who often hitches a piggy back ride now from my character, will try to smooth and braid it as we travel along which my character allows. I also mentioned that there seems to be the odd ink stain occasionally that my character may not have noticed to clean off (my character is a researcher and artist and like most artists will find they have gotten paint or ink on themself and not remember why or how). Despite the fact that my character seems a bit wild like, I will mention that my character stands with a graceful and proper stance, not stiff but not so casual that it’s improper, often either a stoic expression or faint fond smile on their face. This part isn’t really known yet, and probably not suspected until I got my art commissioned for this character, but this character is also trans, sorta. Kinda nonbinary and using she/they. Still, started male physically and hasn’t really gone through the magical process to full transition and is in no rush since they are more NB than otherwise. This is to explain some aspects of their build which are…notably missing (flat chest, slightly broader shoulders that don’t slope the same way as women’s often do, and the Adam’s apple that is often covered by neck jewelry and high collars). Anyway the party latch on quickly to the bits and pieces of physical description I have provided for them regarding my character and I find it sweet that they are invested. Makes my day!
Seriously though, we love to joke about the height my character has because they are the second tallest of the party which is sorta hilarious at times. Makes them pretty good at playing up being a “bodyguard” which we have done before.
Oh and for 2 the party finds my character sketching or writing whenever they have a spare moment. When asked, the character has said they are writing reports or drawing or writing poetry, which they have. One of the players warned me that their character might steal one to see which I ok’d.
3) my character is friendly and fond but is pessimistic who tries to be optimistic. Their story is they are a parentified eldest child who eventually left home after the toxicity got too much. They are compulsively a protector and caretaker. They also have a past where they lost their fiancé during an incident which further reinforced their fear of losing what means most to them. The ongoing war in the continent does not help.
And that leads into 4. They are, as said, compulsively a protecter and caretaker. They also fully blame themself for the lose of their fiancé and will take on far more responsibility for things than they should. This last one is one of the major character arcs I have planned for said character. I want them to learn to stop that or do so in a more reasonable manner. Also this character is one who’s story is about living with the grief of a loved one having passed on (kinda think of that film “Up” and I think you get the general idea though adapted for dnd).
And desires 5, well that leads back to the grief. And also the parentified eldest child thing. Let’s start with eldest child. To start with, my pc has had little to call their own for a long time, including what interests they take and how they use their time. As such, they developed a desire to have something to call their own. One of the ways they started this is by leaving home and joining the faction they did. The other was having a relationship with their fiancé. And that leads into the next part. Their grief. The life plan that they had finally made for themselves is derailed entirely when their fiancé passes away. My pc cannot return to their toxic family and the incident has also alienated them from their fiancé’s family too. They have few friends, some who have stopped talking to them after they lashed out after the incident. So my character is left to pick themselves up on their own. So what do they do with that unmoored feeling? They throw themselves into their research, something their faction fully supports (scholars after all) and so they do that for 15 years as they try to figure themself out again and what they want. And that is simply, a life plan, with, in particular, a life plan that includes something they can call their own. I plan to have that be the party, what with being the found family thing, but we’ll see how that actually plays out still. It’s on track for now however. So basically my character wants purpose. Oh but there is one flawed desire they also have. Due to their survivor’s guilt they also have a small desire they refuse to acknowledge and that is to be “punished” for failing to protect their fiancé. They want someone or something to reinforce for them that the incident was entirely their fault. Is it? Absolutely not! This is not a healthy desire and that is part of the point. It’s a flaw designed for one of my pc’s biggest antagonist to dig into and manipulate my pc with. Namely, the ex brother-in-law who blames my pc for their sibling’s death. My pc believes them. Simple as that. Reminder that it isn’t supposed to be healthy, which is something of a theme in the campaign, which is to conquer these unhealthy mentalities and senses of guilt that we should not take responsibility on our shoulders for as they aren’t ours to carry or even have.
And for fears, that goes back to the incident. Other than the fear of failure my character has and a fear of a lack of purpose, as well as a fear of loneliness, my character has a phobia of the creature that attacked and killed their fiancé. Simple as that.
So yeah that’s how I made this character and I adore it! I love it so much ☺️ and I’m so glad you made their points because it reinforced for me that I made a character who is very investable for my party to play off of. Always encouraging! Thanks for the video!
This is great advice for fiction character writing in general. I have a 6'4" male character as one of my mains. That would affect his daily life for sure!
Davrainbow I am 6'4. Can confirm.
My character is a Elven ranger who hates nobles, as she was treated poorly when she was a maid. It makes her fearful and, that gives her a reason to join the rebellion in our story.
My favorite character I have played is also the most "lived in" and fleshed out character. He's not outright phobic of water but he gets real edgy and kind of snappy when around fast moving or deep water because he watched his older brother drown when he was a kid. He started out as a light hearted fellow but after some near death experiences and after his sister was kidnapped he kind of became a darker brooding type (lots of 1000 yard stares). But in combat he will risk his own life to save or protect his friends because he'll be damned if something bad is going to happen to those he cares about on his watch.
Victor Lopez pretty cool
My favorite character was a young assassin that used certain alchemical...relaxation and anti anxiety aids. I even had him take a purge when he needed to sober up quickly.
I laughed when the gm had my right arm cut off. I told the party that since I was a ninja my power had only increased through the maiming.
Meanwhile my buddy who is a twink and can't help it was super salty because the dice weren't very kind to him that session. I was so into that character that I didn't care about failure. I didn't notice it when I failed as much as before and enjoyed myself more because of it.
For an example of description effecting how i played
i had a human draconic bloodline sorceress, she was being hunted for plot reasons that ill not get into, so i in game got my hair dyed and cut as it was one of the ways i could think of throwing of would be assassins, i also started dressing in bardic style clothes and tried my best to pass off as a nobody bard, which... thanks to a really bad dm resulted in one of the players being force to betray me and then the dm pulling the big bad out of no where so all that work... down the toilet.
The best character I've ever played was a gnome midget.
That wasn't just me being redundant. He was considered by other gnomes to be rather short, since he was 2'1".
Since he was a wizard, the cantrip he most often used was Mage Hand. The spell he ended up using the most was Tenser's Floating Disk, since by standing on it he doubled his height with no real effect on his speed. He also was irrepressibly cheerful, even when he was about to die.
Physical descriptions are kinda important to remember if you're a Goliath in a tiny town
*laughs in is an artist that's overcomplicating the design of my character"
I felt this as a fellow artist oml
Pothead druid with love for cannabis cookies it is then
I fucking love that lmfao
Yo bard this edible aint shi- *wildshapes*
Is it ok for your character to have an odd hair/skin colour (example: white hair+extremely pale skin on a human who is quite young) if you can explain why this is the case?
That's between you and your GM. Just remember the consequences of that though - easily identifiable, marked as different. It's a great role-playing opportunity to be able to have to hide it when being chased, to have angst over the differences etc. It's a potential cool storytelling prop you can add to your character.
Hairdye is very old and many bleach their skin.
There is a genetic trait known as albinism, like if you were to see an albino crocodile. If you have albinism than your body is incapable of producing pigments that make up color so whoever has it is very pale, white hair, and grey eyes. Also a lot of people with albinism don’t have very great eyesight and have to wear glasses. And since i’m pretty sure glasses weren’t invented back then you should just try to make your character’s lowest stat perception
My Goliath has bright blue hair, even though Goliaths aren't supposed to have hair. Even though everyone knows, no one's even mentioned it.
Wouldn't they just be albino then?
Just try to avoid RPing surprise stuff, talk about it with your DM beforehand.
I tried to RP my character losing control when fighting a skeletal horse because my PC is afraid of them, but ended up ruining the session and everyone getting mad at me (and I deeply regret it)
I doubt you "ruined" the session, why do people think when they play a ROLEPLAYING GAME that everything will go according to some pre determined path? Thats dull. The environment should be flexible enough for characters to express themselves realistically
Cool! We got the physical apearance right from the start!
First session: Druid blinding the goblin with his long blond hair in the sun
.
I know this video is a bit old and this might not be seen, but I love this and will use some of it in my character!
I had a Pain Point be a very good changer for a character who I picked up. He was a side-character made by a current player who was part of a Brother-Sister halfling duet, the sister was made by another player. The GM didn't like the idea of two cheeky halflings doing things so he had the girl uhh... forcefully entered to death by an ogre, this was the point where I picked the character up. He became a raging alcoholic, was intoxicated constantly which made my rolls harder, his primary stats were ridiculous though so it wasn't much of an issue, his party had the other abilities he couldn't use anyway. I stopped playing because I didn't have a way to get there anymore and my character was taken out, to come back as a Witch Hunter (The ogre was a witches pet.). Instead of using alcohol to numb himself he used his anger and heartbreak to fuel a sort of combat rage and went around hunting evil. Was a nice turning point and made it easy to pickup a character and gave me a lot of satisfaction in progressing his story.
That's awesome! A great way to work out a problem and to introduce a character back into the game. Thank you for sharing!
Thanks for your video! It's nice to see a youtuber so involved with his community too. I appreciate how much I see your name in your comment section on both of your channels.
I did have a halfling bard who was rather happy go lucky, until his mother got kidnapped by slavers. Just in that short time he went from bard to assassin. That set up some rather interesting opportunities where he would be a bard to infiltrate someplace, and then his daggers came out to play when no one was looking. The first ones to feel the bite of his daggers was the slavers who had his mother.
Really, really scary to see a halfling bard pull a blade and one shot your evil high marshall, then disappear before anyone was the wiser. And he was just the entertainment!
Brilliant video! Delving deeper than most tips. Thank you.
+The Bloody Murphy Files I just hope it helps you guys have a better experience :)
One of my favorite parts of my (recently deceased) Avariel was her fear of airships. She once lost a wing in battle (now had a prosthetic) and as a result of her struggles to find help and escape from the floating island she lost her wing on, she gained a terrible fear of falling and being unable to fly. Because airships were the main way to travel in that world, she would fly on them, but she refused to go indoors for more than a split second, lest the airship be shot out of the sky and she be unable to make it out and end up falling with it. She even refused to go inside when the party ran into a swarm of sky jellyfish, and the party ended up having to use Suggestion to keep her indoors until the jellyfish passed so they wouldn't kill her.
Just got into my first D&D group, my first ever game is happening on a couple of days, and I'm really nervous about roleplaying, but this video has helped me a lot. Thank you so much :')
I just want to say that I only just now found your channel and it is abselutly amasing! really loving this stuff! Thanks!
Real pleasure! As long as it helps you improve your game or have more fun, then I am happy! Welcome to the table!
Yes, yes, yes. Thank you very much. These really are covering some amazing territory here. World view is one of my first factors that I work on for a character. I've not specifically played with pain points, but I can see how some of my characters have had them on a certain level. But character goals... and even growth over the course of a game... those are both unbelievably helpful. Some of my favorite players have been ones that have grown and changed over the course of the game. One started out as the comic relief badass (as a point of reference, he was a flaming battlemage named Ruepaul), but by the end, the stress of his goal (which was actually to conquer a new homeland for his nation that had been turned into a magical wasteland) along with everything else that had been going on wound up transforming and developing the character. More recently, I've played a character that had an interesting mix of growth and lack of change. He was a very low wisdom character, but very good at what he did, which was bringing the pain with hellfire, despite being a very innocent young man, who dressed almost more like a priest than the warlock he was. What amused me the most was that he became a veritable Cassanova in the aftermath of saving a city from a cultist driven plague... despite still being very much dedicated to his God and goodness in general.
Goals have an end.
Desires are indefinite.
For the mannerisms bit, i once played a paladin who was basically an evangelical girl scout, and whenever she formally met someone new i reached out like i was going to shake the npc's hand irl
It wound up earning us a bunch of allies! But it was just kinda taking advantage of an automatic gesture i had been taught
The same paladin also wound up bonding a ton with our halfling who fools people into thinking they're a child, and they both had a great opportunity to reveal secrets, since she herself hides that she's a half-elf.
I also have started having a thing with my aasimar being anxious about ruining their long feathery hair and it's led to a lot of fun weird workarounds and rp opportunities
It's all about yes-and-ing to the campaign! Pick up on details and prop your character development up with it!
What do you do about players that just dont seem to care whatsoever about their character, not even their class or race? For context I have a player who when i asked what kind of character he was thinking of, he said simply "a knight". So i asked again, well, what kind. Theres always Fighter, tho we have a decent amount of dps as it is. But we do need a tank for the team. Maybe a Fighter, or even a Warpriest, to frontline? And his response was "no i dont want any of that, just make me a knight. medium armor and a greatsword." I have no idea what to say about it. I asked what kind of race, he said he didnt care. All he seems to care about is being able to mercilessly smash with a greatsword, and rp as a gentleman knight. Tried everything i could think of to get him involved. Eventually i literally made him a character and asked what he thought of it and the intended personality (idk if he wants a charismatic knight or a smashy knight), and he just said "sure, itll work" and no notes. Asked him if there was anything hed want to change, or add, or anything. Just got an "eh". I had actually made him a Barbarian Half Orc wth negative mental stats (20 point buy campaign) and really high physical stats who has a stature similar to lenny from Mice and Men. He means well and wishes for greater things and to help others, but he just cant help himself. He gets carried away, his Orcish blood boils a bit too thick. But in the end he has good intentions. This way he can smash, and hes semi tanky since Barbarians arent TOO bad at that. And beyond that RPing is up to him. Well, he decided to randomly throw in his only request: that his character be albino. Wasnt sure why, but ok. He's now albino. Aversion to fire and direct sunlight, as well as a slight bonus to disguise checks to pretend hes a burly, ugly elf. So I told him that as a gift, the town that knew of his good natured soul and his pesky condition decided to make him a patch cloak of pretty decent quality for him, to help with the sunlight. HE DIDNT UNDERSTAND WHY HE GOT A CLOAK, AND EVEN SASSED ME ABOUT IT. He had no intention of RPing the albino bit. He just wanted to say he was. And hes talking with all the info he the player has, and quickly and concisely some how, and has a casual, rolling accent and a self inserted charismatic attitude. And im just sitting here like IF YOU HAD WANTED TO BE A CHARISMATIC KNIGHT YOU SHOULDVE SAID SO INSTEAD OF REPEATEDLY SAYING GIBBERISH, I COULDVE MADE YOU A TACTICIAN FIGHTER SO YOURE MORE ABOUT THE CARE OF THE TEAM AND THE UPSTANDING NATURE OF YOUR LAWFULNESS. INSTEAD OF A CG HALF ORC BARBARIAN WITH NEG MENTALS. So i just dont know what to do. Maybe you can give me some ideas. All my other characters are super into their guys. I got a Human Gunslinger who has dreams of becoming a merchant and mass producing firearms for the country, seeing as how the world is relatively gunless. He wishes to fix that and be a gun toting mogul. I have a Human Bard whos actually female being played by a male character who has actually committed to the RP of being a woman who wishes to make herself and her compatriots world famous and to get as many people as humanly possible to know and respect their names. I have a Human and an Elf (two players) who are both Bladebound Magus who taught under the same master who wish to track down the ancient, lost arcane secrets in the world, albeit for VERY different reasons. The Human is negligent to fight, preferring his studies and his books greatly. He sacrificed his martial training a bit for an extensive array of research and studies and has become a veritable swiss army knife of a man. He wishes to track down the lost arcanes for the potential they posses and for the utilities they could provide. Then the Elf is more combat prowess than book smart. He left the library a bit more than hes proud of to practice with his blade in the yard. Hes a brilliant fighter with a dedicated heart towards his goals. He seeks the lost arcanes for the practical uses it could provide, as well as the raw power is no doubt holds for him. So I have all these interesting characters with players going all in for it, and then this other guy. Literally didnt make his guy because he didnt care enough to even tell me a play style, and is now RPing a completely different being from what i made for him. Any thoughts?
He's a dick ! =D
He must be more interesting in the mechanics than the roleplay. There's absolutely nothing wrong with that, but it is frustrating to have a mechanics gamer in a role playing game or a role player in a mechanics game. Why don't you ask him about it. Without saying that he is playing the game wrong(because he isn't, just a different way), ask him if you can help him with his character and roleplaying. Tell him that this is a roleplaying group and that if you going to not roleplay then you might want an explanation for it. Like what if he's a construct made by the wizard of the party to help them in the journey, that way he doesn't have to roleplay, or maybe he's just very stoic and mysterious. I know that it might be hard to do this after you have already started, but you get the idea. And he's not ok with doing something like that, then don't push it. Unless he is ruining the experience for the other players, he can play however he wants. But if he is running the experience for the other players, then tell him that he does need to do something about it
Boot him out of the group
kick him, sounds like a textbook problem player to me
My lizardfolk rogue is 4ft tall and 78 lbs so he rides on his goliath companion's shoulders. He's also slowly building a relationship with the Titan bard in the party. He doesn't want to admit it but he likes when the bard plays the songs of his people. Slowly he's starting to act more friendly. And pats his companion on the back whenever his performance goes otherwise upraised.
One thing that could work is maybe have the character be allergic to a certain thing (or some other kind of involuntary reaction). Probably not so sever that they'd go into anaphylactic shock in the middle of an adventure but something that might hamper them or at least cause them to have to make choices. Healing potions cause them to break out in hives, or gnolls make her sneeze, or a particular type of alien has weird reactions happen to them in systems with a particular type of star (oh wait that's Superman. Anyway!). Obviously something a player would have to work out with their GM, but could be interesting for the right kind of group.
Starting the carrion Crown in a few days and since i had my character have siblings and a living parent in a location within the campaign I had to write up bios for 3 siblings and mother, then threw in my vision of the family tavern including what roles each family member filled. It really helped me get a better understanding of my character! I just have to hope my DM doesn't have an issue with me essentially creating the layout of a building in her campaign
6) Phobias & Fears:
In Neverwinter Online;
There's a Fire Giant that finds "small folk" off putting, and has issues with a really big bird.
I wonder...
One of the first things I like to make sure I know is why in the world would my character leave home on adventure, and boy has it been a hard question sometimes! One of mine left home because his teacher is sick and he's looking for a rare herb to cure her, one was born in prison and wants to see all of the natural world, and a pair simply are seeking the ultimate thrill and true glory. It usually really helps me nail down a general personality and goals!
How to make them scared "I SUMMON THE STAR TURTLE" (look it up)
I needed this. I made a Dwarf fighter and gave him a backstory but didn't know how to play him at the table and how he would interact, leaving me often silent in social situations, maybe this will help, thanks.
I have a 6ft human apprenticed to a dwarven blacksmith. I only realized what that would mean a session or two ago.
Physical Description
Mannerisms
Pain points
World view
Desires
Fears and phobias
I have a character in waiting that is a halfling teen who's a spitfire and slightly obnoxious, but utterly terrified of pigs. Anything that is pig like reminds her of the giant ( to her) hogs on her father's farm and she panics
Thank you this was super helpful, those 6 points took my character from a specific backstory into a fully fledged out personality.
Cheers man, thanks for the brilliant videos!
6) Phobias and Fears:
You're sitting at the table, drinking a Coke. "This Coke
tastes like a Pepsi."
My character has a fear of crowds :3 And that's actually a disadvantage picked in the character creation .. In order to get advantages you have to pay them with disadvantages xD
I had a character who was an alchemist/witch, she ended up with this disease that was connected to the dream realm. so she went to a mage doctor looking for a cure. he only had a recipe that would extend her life to a year rather than the 6 months she had without it. he provided her with the recipe, and one of the ingredients was Ectoplasm. while at the mage's college, she went looking for the ingredients and ran into a teacher, that turned out to be a lich, who had it. the teacher said she would trade the ectoplasm for some blood. well to put it bluntly DM had her clone my character, then had me play the clone, without me knowing, and I didn't find out about it until we were sucked into the dream realm, and there were two of me. needless to say the clone alchemist/witch developed a fear of being killed off by the original and would panic anytime we were in the same room.
We have a player who has a pain point, it's called "The Hill Dwarf Cleric in a small, low level party that wants to take on the Storm Giant and his small army."
The fears bit can be especially interesting for the character. For instance, my first character in a game of Deadlands: Reloaded was a Metal Mage, but, because i limited him to only being able to control metal in a solid state, he had a paralyzing fear of mercury, because it made him feel powerless. When that character died and his soul transferred into my new character (long story), the new character kept that fear of mercury, though it was no longer paralyzing, but he also gained a fear of the demonic trees that killed the first character twice over. Later on, my DM used that fear of the demon trees to hinder my new character's progress while he was travelling through Hell.
Before anyone asks, no, Hell and demon trees are not normal things to find in Deadlands. My DM is just a crazy person.
My current character is a former town guard with a dislike of the upper class, who is the only nonviolent member of an incredibly murderous group (I'm a Neutral Good character in an entirely Chaotic Evil and Chaotic Neutral party). Instead of character progression, he is regressing to become more like them - the people he initially had a "What am I DOING with this lot?" view of. At some point in the future, he's going to realize this is completely against his ideals and retire, and let the adopted Gnoll son he was forcefully given by the party take his place.
Best character I've ever played.
My current favorite character is a Necromancer, but she's like the polar opposite of your stereotypical necromancer. She's shy and bookwormish, wears a big blue sweater and tiny reading glasses. She's studying necromancy because she's fascinated by ghosts after being possessed by one. She's also wholesome and endearing, despite being very antisocial. Easily some of the most fun I've had roleplaying.
My character is in no way a Druid (she’s a Bard) but she despises when people harm nature. And whenever she might kill a wild animal (probably for necessary food) she will always thank it for its sacrifice. It’s probably good to mention that I haven’t ever played her yet, but I am working very hard on her.
I'm really enjoying this video series, because I have been wondering how to be a better player, so this helps a ton
Glad to hear that!
I started out with "no no listen to the drow!" and now I'm at "well they decided this.... We're all going to die"
My character (a half orc witch named Balor la Fleur) was scarred physically and mentally by his mother and her court of noblewomen. Because of this, he hides his pain and fear behind pride and rudeness; although internally he is terrified of people telling him what to do; as he feels like he'll lose the freedom he fought so hard to achieve.
My character loves people, all she wants is to be surrounded. Even so, she's a tiefling, and she doesn't realise that some people will always hate her. She is confident she can overcome her tiefling stereotype, ans so her growth is learning that some people in her world are cruel, and that some people will not like her, and that she must overcome the Naïve perspective that everyone can be good
Talking of mannerisms... I have rudisms.
If anyone trips, falls over, or gets hurt for ANY reason, I immedately ask "are you dead? Got any gold?"
Too bad that the first two deaths were by Tarrasque and there WAS no gold to loot.
Because if there was.... I'd have a few more gp.
Pain points? Gnome racist. We have a Gnomish Cleric- I barely tolerate him in the party. He tries to heal me, I'll resist the spell or even go so far as to stab myself to refuse his help.
Fear? Dragons. In backstory, he was nearly (unintentionally) sacrificed to a dragon to a brutal death: This expierience scarred the Kobold, and even brings a strange sort of hypocritical stance to him, as Ominak is f***ing terrified of dragons but is super prideful of his draconic heritage, only further inflating his ego that he is Dragonwrought, and he loves anything dragon themed.
As for physical description...
Because being a Dragonwrought Kobold means I'll get wings, and my (basically) best friend is a Dragonborn, we thought of an idea using my character's stature: Tie a spear to my back, chuck me as I open my wings, AND BECOME THE WORLD'S FIRST HOMING MISSLE!
Any tips on a gnome barbarian that multiclassed as druid? Please?
You say that we don't see change in roll playing, but I always try to include character development within my characters. One such character was one named Rachel, who was a rogue that became an assassin for the soul purpose of killing those who would harm innocent people, but as time progressed she realized this was still murder, and that there is no way to truly get rid of this dilemma. Because of this she stopped being an assassin and instead ended up becoming a diplomat for a country to use her passionate beliefs within an environment that could gain allies for the people she cared about, changing her entire outlook.
We don't often see change. And when we do it's magical. A lot of players though don't think of change or growth as something part of the game.
Bacon Battalion RPG ah, that makes sense. Personally having a character change throughout the story normally makes it more fun and interesting for me, and usually other people, especially the gm
I wish I knew someone with the same level of wisdom such as yourself so I could get some direct advice.
my sea trog is very mild mannered due to isolation in exile and is always slightly begrudging to get into dangerous environments because he was forced physically to join the adventure on threat of death
My elf has been among humans so much that he's "give native" and lost touch with his elven roots; his arch is going to be reconnecting and re-establishing that connection to his Elven haraitige, where he'll stop acting as "pragmatic" and start getting a sense of wonder and etherealness to his tone.
I once had a character who was a Druish princess - a halfling druid with a to thick Brooklyn accent. Lol I think the party secretly voted to have her killed.Oy vey!
We actually had something come up where my tortle weighed too much for a party member to carry but my legs were broken. It became a huge role play encounter that the group really enjoyed.
Really like this video, helps me improve on my current character.
He started as a lv1 Dwarf Cleric with a great fear of the undead, cuz when he was young, his home was overrun with hordes of undead, but his parents sacrificed themselves to save him and his sister. He then later on wanted to work as a cleric as a way to banish and protect himself and those around him, his fear was still there, which he didn't like, he wanted to go out and experience the world to try to combat this fear, help more people, make the world a better place. Now, he's currently lv5 (lv3 Cleric, lv2Wizard) and he's dabbling into necromancy as a way to overcome his fear and instead use it's power against itself. But to keep him interesting, he's now starting to develop a fear of corrupting himself with the dark arts, he needs to balance the light and darkness, he's getting thoughts about him rising as a lich and a tyrant and ultimately becoming what he once feared the most.
@13:00 comic relief fears...
You mean like your starfinder medic screaming at the SPOILERS: mutated electrovore after trying to play dead?🤣💗 That was gold, pure, solid, 24k gold. Thank you I almost fell off my chair that time
My character Brook has a few phobias. First of all, she can't understand religion because she grew up in an irreligious community who only rever the forest they hunt in (because at least they can see that), and she also fears it because it is well known in most shifter communities that an order religious fanatics of elves and humans tried to wipe out her race on multiple occasions. So whenever she meets clerics or paladins or the like, her reactions range from mild contempt to open hostility. For the aforementioned reason she is also pretty xenophobic and takes a long time to trust anyone, especially of a different race, but once she bonds, she bonds for life.
She also doesn't like books because, well, she can't read, and also because she fears the power that they can have over people.
I assume things will get pretty interesting because my DM has confirmed that in her world, the gods are real and will likely play a big part in the late game, so I'm actually excited to see how she'll react to seeing her own power so utterly dwarved by something she didn't even believe existed.
She has already had a little taste of that when she was actually killed by a Lich in the early game, but inexplicably woke up in the field before the temple with only the scars of wounds that were lethal, dotted all over her body as a reminder. This has understandably upset her quite a bit, since, if there is no such thing as higher powers, or an afterlife, how come she is still alive and even remembers a conversation she had with the ghost of someone in her past?
To be honest, I'm thrilled to see where my DM takes this, character plots are always the best plots in my opinion:D
at one point when i was younger my imagination got so wild i got nightmares from playing a campain, and couldnt sleep well for about two weeks
Ashka just wants to see the world, he wants to get away from the structure of the nest and be free. So he runs. He runs away from the nest into the Wild, trains with weapons, shortbows, shortswords, meets a... new friend. Rides into combat on his new friend. Ashka- Kobold, Ranger, Tamer of Pteradons.
I'm a wizard, I fear everything with knifes, or swords, or clubs...
I have a character who's pain point is romance
When my first PC started the DND campaign, she was a wide eye bushy tailed vain wizard with a fear of thunderstorms and lightning. By the end of the campaign she had persuaded a noble that she was a cortisan to get access to the secrets of litchdom, committed genocide, and saw herself as basically a goddess made flesh. All with a very stupid accent.
i have a lawful Evil oathbreaker, trying to replace the ruler in his homeland with someone he chooses, because he was betrayed and they had his brother killed after framing him.. so now he burns for Revenge, but planning on making him less so depending on the story and the situations that arise, if things goes even more to shit, I might fall lower, maybe multiclass into wizard and pick up necromancy or do Warlock. he is 1 lvl warlock and 4 paladin, Maybe give him to the DM to use as a minor villain if things go to much south.. If it becomes better and he achieve some of his goals he might pick up idk, Bard? but he will always have his dark tendencies but in a lighter way. also has fear of open fire, because he started worshipping Sargonnas after his mind became weak, and became sort of brainwashed from his madness after he found his brother dead. (who was my first character ever, im fairly new to d&d and got bored wtih my character).
Pain points is a great one. I made a LE character who was a sociopath, but their one main point of empathy was someone losing a loved one. They had lost a loved one in their past, which ended up with them becoming an assassin and losing their regard for human life. They still have the ability to care for others (hence how a LE character works well in a party), but it’s very slow to develop with the one exception of having empathy towards that one specific exception.
In a steampunk RPG I'm going to start soon, I'll be playing an acrobatic, swashbuckling bounty hunter who's very cynical and jaded because he grew up in a horrible neighborhood; but he still has a soft spot for people in need because he knew what it was like to need someone to rely on. What kind of fears should I give him?
Side note; he's really small for a human man, roughly 5' 3", and he has a thing for rope swinging. Not only is he not bothered by people making comments about his height, but he's found ways to use it to his advantage. At least, that's what I'm going with in my head.
I’m sorry but I have to laugh at “the really small for a human man.” At 5’3” he’s almost 3 inches taller than me and I am a full grown man.
I loved this, this was extremely helpful. I felt my char was unfinished, now i feel my char is very refine