I'm DMing a 3.5e game right now full of weird and interesting characters. One is a warforged monk who spent most of his 720 years buried in a collapsed cavern. he had many years to meditate and has a lot of wisdom, but he has no actual experience with anything. he once wandered away from a battle because he saw a bee and wondered aloud "how does it even fly with those little wings?" another character was a human werewolf who never turned into a werewolf because he was afraid of persecution. so he spent most of his time as the weakest character until he finally used his werewolf form in a tough battle against a large bullette. the only problem was he transformed right after the bullette died, so he revealed his secret for no reason. another was a half nymph character who couldn't decide if she wanted to be a two weapon melee rogue or a long range archer rogue. so she spent most of the time running back and forth from melee range to long range and climbing trees. she hardly ever attacks. another is a dwarf fighter who's nickname is stinky. he is constantly trying to get himself killed because the player wants to roll a new character. but it turns out that all of the crazy, suicidal, stuff he does to try to die (diving down the throat of the bullette. he didn't know bulletes don't like dwarf) ends up saving the party or becoming a turning point in a battle that isn't going well. the dice always favor him in those situations. there is a lizardfolk barbarian who generally does almost half the total damage in battles by himself, but he's all depressed and thinks he is weak because he never actually lands any finishing blows. so he is constantly looking for anything he can find to make himself stronger. he also continually forgets to use his rage. then there is the (blue)dragonborn rogue who has a very high intelligence. she has so many skill points that she basically makes the other rogues obsolete. she also has a lightning breath weapon that wreaks havoc in battles and ends up hitting the dwarf fighter at least half the time. she's also extremely shy and spends most non battle encounters hiding behind the lizardman. Lastly there is the character I ran as the DM back when it was just me and 2 players who didn't know how to play. he was a Goliath under 3.5 rules so he had more str, more hit dice, and was able to use large size weapons due to a feat. but he barely spoke common and took everything anybody said as 100% literal and he was brutally honest, even in situations were honesty would get you killed. so generally he was told to not speak (a good way for the DMs character to not become the party crutch.) so one time the dwarf was threatening a member of the kings guard and said "back off or you'll get a foot up your ass!" (again the dwarf trying to die) and obviously the guard did not back off. half way through the ensuing battle, the Goliath had that guard bent over and was shoving his size 42 foot up the guards ass, who was in turn begging the dwarf to end his life. once we got more players to the game the Goliath left for his own adventures, only to show up for the occasional visit from time to time.
My craziest D&D character: Level 1, Human Wizard, 18 years old. He came from a middle class family, with both of his parents and both of his siblings still alive, and the family owned a mapmaking shop that he was working in part time, and was in line to inherit one day. No family issues, no mental illness, no traumatic childhood. He was just a kid. Crazy, huh?
My friend created her first charater in a simillar fashion, in short time she became jelaous of all the character plots we got because of our ritcher backstories and asked the DM if she could flash the character out.
The all time greatest character I've played so far was in 5E. Magikarp, the Splashing. He was a Circle of the Moon druid, and he would refuse to Wild Shape into anything other than fish and sharks and whatnot, regardless of the water available. My greatest kill was from jumping above an enemy and turning into an orca.
My friend was playing a character who opened every door he found (just to piss of the dm who was that guy when he played) and finally the dm got tired of it and behind this particular door he put a zombie ogre. So the player and ogre looked at each other for a moment, the dwarf did the classic I'm in the wrong place wave and closed the door. We asked him what was going on. While struggling to hold the door closed replies with, "Nothing", like nothing was happening. Then he suddenly releases the door. Ogre fails a dex save. The player the charges into the room screaming "THE DWARVES ARE UPON YOU!", in dwarvish (IRL!) and attempts to grapple it. Nat 20... tackles it to the ground so we surround it attacking. All the while he's nailing the strength rolls to keep it on the ground until we kill it in 3 rounds. Needless to say my favorite moment playing so far.
Homebrew world. Goblin Paladin named Jaxegazy. His "god" Skavishga was a voice in his head who had told him to help protect the city. To do so he would bang the tin cup of his mess kit with the spoon, randomly chant, sing, dance, and do everything in his power to attract enemies. The most epic moment was when he and the party had been tracking some goblins who had run away and we heard voices around the corner in the road. Jax immediately ran around the corner of the road, saw a bunch of orcs slaughtering the goblins we had been chasing and promptly pulled a Han Solo in the Death Star style about face. Unfortunately, just recently Jaxegazy died because a ghost who was possessing an ally screamed at him, Jax failed his save and immediately aged 40 years....becoming the first goblin in any D&D game I've ever played to die of old age.
Eldmirst the faded; easily my most fun role playing experience ever. Back story was an arch made who discovered a means of time travel. As he research was progressing, he quickly garnered the attention of the underdark and malicious forces of the omniverse. Struggling to keep his research out of their hands, he decided this power was not suitable for academic endeavors and didn't want it replicated by others. He destroyed all his work, his books, his lab and finally tried to focus a mind wipe on himself. Thus, Eldmirst the faded was a 3rd level sorcerer, who was bananas insane. He carried a mailbox he insisted was his familiar. He was constantly jabbering on about intrigues with the divine courts love affairs (referencing his past time as a romance novelist), while talking to his true familiar, a small rat that did his best to keep him out of trouble. Eldmirst changed his familiars name frequently, but scuttles is the most common. The general consensus was that he, in his long life, knew these spells intrinsically, and was casting them via muscle memory. Third session in, we went back to Aulbrim, Where 357 Murltes Ln. (The mail box's address) was located, and when the party saw the cratered husk of an arch mage's wizard tower, the expressions on everyone's faces were priceless. From there, the DM wove pieces of backstory I insisted on not knowing through the storyline. It was a lot of fun, Eldmirst the faded never died when the group went separate ways, so I like to think he's still roaming the streets.
we encountered bag of devouring. I named it Tina, she was my friend and I fed her my dinner scraps, as well as all of the bodies that we needed to dispose of. I miss Tina.
The catapult t rex reminded me of a character concept my friends and I made Goliath Strength Ranger. Weapon of choice: small humanoids (dead or alive), especially his druid halfling buddy Goliath casts lightning arrow/conjure volley, throws Halfling buddy as an improvised weapon. Halfling transforms into an elephant/mammoth midair. Hilarity ensues.
There is a 3.5 Prestige class called the Hulking Hurler. Literally, your one and only job is to throw big objects at the enemy. You need to be at least Large to gain entry though.
Reminds me of the NPC Jovian (Bastards and Bloodlines half-giant) fighter my party came across, named I'i (read Eeeee). Had a massive sword and throwing rocks... or throwing whatever. He wasn't very bright, but not stupid, either. The problem was that he had been raised by goblins infected with infernal taint, who had taught him all sorts of erroneous things to keep him feeling dumb and inadequate. So, for example, he firmly believed that rocks loved to fly toward bad people to hug them, maybe even to death if they didn't straighten up. He was also absolutely convinced that the font of all magic was bunnies. The party befriended him by killing him and bringing him back, a direct appeal to his instinct of might making right. They freed him from the goblins by telling him that they had, which he believed, and giving him a last name to prove it, which the goblins would never do. His full name became I'i Chuxaroq. He accompanied the party for a bit, then stayed on in the city they helped found, as a guardian. Some time later, the remnants of the party encounter a Jovian in mage armor and robes with bunnies embroidered on it. Apparently, in the gap time, I'i had encountered an anthropomorphic rabbit (Animen) wizard and begged him nearly to death to teach him the secrets of his bunny magic. So, at long last, the poor slave I'i had become his own version of success, now I'i Chuxaroq, Grand High Bunny Mage and Second Protector of the Independent City-State of Samsara. He still threw rocks, but they were usually spelled with fireball or some such before they left his hand. The damage was insane.
The Poultrymancer: hard to play at low levels but about lvl 12-15 it becomes extra broke. A Necromancer focused on creating an infinite army of exploding undead chickens.
Back in D&D 3.5, I played a medically insane Sorcerer. Poor guy had been on board a ship, minding his own business, when the ship sank. He managed to get away with his flying carpet, his magical staff, a frying pan, and an Endless Decanter of Dwarven Ale. With a bit of string and a bent nail, he managed to use his staff as a fishing rod, and in the haze of a bit too much dwarven ale, he remembered to steer by the sun to get back to land. Unfortunately, he stayed too drunk to remember that the sun moves during the day... Three months later, with an impressive sunstroke and a severe case of alcoholism, the party picked him up in their own ship and recruited him. A bit later in Waterdeep, he traded in his magic staff for enchanting his frying pan; at that point, he was just more attached to the frying pan... it turned out to be Flying and Spell Storing. The party moved their ship into drydock while he was commissioning his upgrade, though, so when the ship wasn't where he expected to find it, he reasoned quite clearly that it must be where he would not expect to find it, namely near the heights of the city. So for the next week or so, he wobbled around Khelben's tower looking for the ship... until one of the others found him and brought him back on board. The favourite spell he put in the frying pan, though, was Dimension Hop. In a naval campaign. Getting teleported 30 feet in a random direction can be hazardous on people on a ship's deck. And stating "I'm reloading my frying pan" shouldn't really ever be a logical statement in a battle... Man, I miss crazy old Careldon... :D
One time I wanted to play a Sorcerer, and this was Pathfinder so you can choose from a LONG list of sorcerous origins. I chose Plague Sorcerer. Dac'han the dwarven plague sorcerer, who accidentally killed his whole family as a child and had lived in the sewers ever since. He was a disgusting, stinking man-child who constantly got scared and needed hugs. He died when the paladin in the group finally snapped and back hand smacked him off a cliff xD
Two characters- Paul- a delusional noble warrior who wears an eagle mask. When he was a little boy (he was a bastard half orc to a very accepting family of elves) his older brother- Plinsky would always tease him and call Paul a dirty rat, when Paul told his mother of his numerous wrongdoings. Plinsky considered himself to be a fox, smarter than the admittedly not so bright Paul. When the family died to a group of robbers, Paul lost it when Plinsky somehow made off with all the family's inheritance. Paul sought out and struck Plinsky down, donning an eagle mask to show he had surpassed Plinsky. He roams around crazily, refusing to accept the eagle mask isn't part of his face, and fights for the weak. Rolls- an extremely acrobatic dwarf with one unique quality. He dual wields shields AND he has a third strapped to his back. This of course, ties in perfectly with his acrobatic skills, and he would always cartwheel inbetween his allies and the enemies to block all kinds of things. He became famous among our group for refusing to walk like a normal person. He would always roll and flip and perform a variety of impressive moves to move mere feet. He has no walking speed, and he refuses to go anything but maximum speed. He also later gained the ability to essentially toss his shields Cap. America style, and Rolls would spin in a circle, and shoot out three bouncing shields, knocking enemies out and seducing women. Fun as hell to play.
I played a warforged bard who very much acted like a robot. I know they're not actually robots, but that's how I played him, and we had fun with it. One time, I accidentally gave the result of a check in the robotic voice I used for the character, and from that point on, we decided he had the capacity to analyze and assign numerical values to his performance on various tasks, which he would then announce. As a flaw, the DM allowed me to make him three laws compliant, in reference to Isaac Asimov's laws of robotics.
An exile Goliath Wizard (Necromancer), Big Daddy Voodoo, or my old 2nd edition D&D character named Onyx Ironhelm who was a dwarf Cook (fighter) who wore cooking utensils as armor and weapons (a steel washboard as a breast plate, a giant meat cleaver as an axe etc.) just some of my goofy characters.
I had a 4th edition swarm druid named Vespidae Karinwald who rather than being a human who could turn into a swarm she was a colony of wasps who could turn into a human. She would always refer to herself in the plural and rather than having a collective consciousness I treated the wasps as individuals and they had some fun conversations with each other. My brother was in town for two sessions of my current game and rather than making a character he just played a nonchalant talking goat using the stats from the monster manual. He was rather under powered but the party overcame most of the encounters without violence because of the confusion caused by that goat.
My craziest? Very hard choice...but I have a few to give as examples: 1) Crackhorn: A triceratops Saurian Wizard that tended to use smaller opponents as clubs and cast mostly utility spells; he never even learned fireball. He would wade into the combat and start smashing/goring/and stomping long before he would cast. 2) Twist: An Elven Sorcerer (before 3rd came along, it was a home brew, but matched the eventual Sorc pretty perfectly) that used Spider Climb, Polymorph, Knock, and various other odd low level spells exclusively. He played as a thief (without any levels in it) and did rather well. 3) Bradley: A world displaced human from Earth that became a Ranger...wielding an enchanted ( fired magic missiles) hunting rifle. The enchantment a gift from the world hopping wizard that accidentally stranded him. 4) Fredrick Bladesilver (aka Fred the Funky Fighter-Mage; aka Archmage Stinky; aka The Purple Mage): A wizard of high family and status struck multiple times with Madness from various sources as he became more powerful and a thorn in their sides. Becoming Fred the Funky Fighter-Mage after the first such incident (and a level of Fighter) he became responsible for some ingenious magic items, such as the Maps of Fred (gps maps, but I first created this in the late eighties); the Rainbow Blades (Prismatic Spray lightsabers) ; Rings of Sound Sleep (put them on and you fall asleep into a time ignoring stasis, pull them off and the wearer awakens perfectly refreshed, whether a century or five seconds passed); and others. Later being tossed into a Bog of Eternal stench by an angry Demon Lord as he attempted to overthrow him and getting hit *again* with madness, he became Stinky and climbed to god-like levels of power, becoming Archmage Stinky, responsible for a number of world sized pocket dimensions and incredible artifacts (most of which had really random effects or drawbacks). After challenging a dark god he was struck with a curse and alignment swap, becoming the greatly feared (and heavily depowered) Purple Mage, “terrorizing” a number of worlds with his bizarre and sometimes nonsensical “evil plans”.
I played halforc half tiefling with a mental complex. She hated that she was half orc. She had a complex where she wanted to die but it had to be glorious. Basically made a viking.
we had a tiefling sorcerer who was a massive clepto maniac, in the first session he collected so much stuff that he was almost immobile and none of us new because he cast minor illusion on himself.
Surprised they didn't mention the most legendary and broken D&D character, the man who WON 'Call of Cthulhu' while playing 'Trail of Cthulhu', the man who went a little crazy after Vietnam, despite never having set foot in the country. The guy who talked with his pet stuffed parrot while assuming that the other party members were hallucinations. Crazy. Old Man. Henderson.
For four years now I've been playing a character aptly named The Cheat. He started off as a rogue, and eventually became a cleric of Olidammara, even becoming a Divine Agent of Olidammara. For years he skimmed off the top of the group loot stash (never let a thief manage your group's loot). When the time came I told my GM I was going to fund the creation of a Cold Iron Golem. He told me the price as a joke, and I gave him the gold.. and the documents to prove I had it and where I'd been stealing from the group for 3 years previous. The whole room went silent.I still play The Cheat. Now he's a plane traveling miscreant who dabbles in evil artifacts that he really shouldn't be getting his hands on. He does the holy work of Olidammara which is usually eat drink and be merry, and occasionally sew chaos. Its a great plot device for getting adventuring groups out to fix the things he messes up.
We maintain a group inventory for gold and items instead of splitting it all up right away. So I was made the fool to keep track of all inventory because I type fastest. So every time we split out some money to buy something I held a little back from the "chest" and squirrel some away onto my character sheet.
Had a wizard in a group do something similar, but he had a bartering ability that made us sell things for a slight markup, he kept the markup. Ended up funding his spell book, he owned every spell up to 5th level. His "spellbook"was an indexed bookcase in a portable hole.
Oh gosh, Dave's story just made me remember Dumbleduck, my crazed gnome necromancer in a One Shot game. had 4 zombies, Frank, Frenk, Fronk, and Frunk, and was on a quest for the perfect Frink. Had a fish in a fishbowl, and had a compulsion to show literally every animate creature his fish. his last words while being disintegrated by a beholder were "Have you seen my fish?" "...yes, I have seen your fish." "yaaaaaay...." Dumbleduck died happy XD
The funniest character I've had the pleasure of adventuring with was a druid named Sour P who, true to his name, peed on everything, but he was so charismatic he got away with it. My craziest character is a dwarf bard who used to be a soldier but chickened out, ran away and joined the circus. He is not a typical musically inclined bard, though. He activates his bard powers by telling bad jokes and puns.
Dave, thanks for the Gutwrench shout out. RIP, old buddy. My oddest character was a 2E Shadowrun character: "Killjester" Killjester was a Street Samurai but didn't fight like regular cyborgs. He fought like he was living in a cartoon. He carried a large "trick bag" filled with small exploding wind-up robots and dinosaur toys, a yoyo rigged as a grenade, chem-sprayers rigged with DMSO and tattoo dye (perfect for permanently staining opponents' faces and blinding them), and the like. Yes, he had guns and such, but that was for when things got too serious. He once used a caulking gun to line a wall with liquified explosive in the shape of Bugs Bunny crashing through a wall, and when that went off, he had a tennis ball launcher loaded with super-bouncy balls shoot through the hole as a distraction. THEN he came in through an upper window with smoke grenades (loaded with spray glue and sparkles) and SMGs. Any foes he defeated were left at the scene with foam clown noses super-glued on. If KJ fell in combat, he had a "deadman switch" hooked up to a plastic daisy that would pop out of his chest armor. If the other players wanted to play Shadowrun, there would be "are you playing Killjester tonight?" concerns. The "Killjester" concept was so inspiring that I always found a way to make the concept for other systems, including the World of Darkness LARP. "Dementation" in gameplay from a guy in mime facepaint and a camo vest and spiked wristbands....that set the tone. My friend Paul had a great Shadowrun character nicknamed "Packrat" who was a Raccoon shaman. He wanted to embrace the animal side of the totem, and rummaged through garbage, always dipped his food in water or coffee, and was constantly in trouble. Imaging a guy who barely cracks 5' tall, and who can't drive, but insists on doing so in a powerful muscle car. The accelerator was worn smooth, the brake pedal was bent, and the clutch had a spider living under it from disuse. It's a good thing that car was armored... That campaign was pretty zany. Where other shamans would summon spirits or throw fireballs, he'd use Control Actions to make a foe sing "I'm a Little Teapot", dance and all.
My weirdest character was a Rogue named Freya Something. She was human but raised by gnomes after her parents were killed. Her gnome family were merchants and alchemists so she was always trying to make business contacts and sell questionable gnomish goods. The thing is that her Wisdom was low and she didn't really understand people or indeed anything she didn't learn in a book. When she found a ragged blanket in an evil stronghold she thought it was a mythical wraith cloak and began wearing it as a cape. Someone in the party mockingly called it Wraith Cloak, Devourer of Souls and the name stuck. Freya had the last laugh when the cloak later gained intelligence and an ego.
In my regular D&D group, I'm regularly known as the person who comes up with odd or crazy character concepts. Probably the two craziest that I have would be my two jester characters (both made for 5e) . One was Zenith, a chimeric high elf (meaning things like his hair and eyes were colored differently) who was born and raised in a large family that ran a traveling circus. He was a dancer (specifically a belly dancer) who ended up becoming a masked jester and a fighter. He wielded two bladed tambourines, kicked ass, delivered puns ( "-guy is burnt to ash from a dragon's fire breath- Guess that guy made an ash-hole of himself eh?" -cue party groaning- ) and all that good stuff. In the campaign, he eventually became a vampire after screw-ups were made (though the vampirism was significantly tweaked so my character was balanced with the rest of the party). Sadly, that campaign crumbled due to scheduling conflicts and the DM lost his notes and everything when his computer fried so that was that for Zenith. The other jester character is Gesture. He's a monk, way of the shadow, effectively works like a Dark Brotherhood assassin. He uses the guise of a fool to get into the courts of nobility, uses the position to obtain information and secrets, assassinates people and all that jazz. The funny thing about him was that he was effectively a mime in a jester costume. His attire was black, white and red, he was mute and had to communicate via charades or notes (until he could take a dip into Warlock, pact of the Great Old One and could use telepathy). He only got to be in a campaign for two sessions before that game fell apart (different group, same scheduling issues). But it was hilarious to see the group go 'oh great it's a mime' and then he proceeds to nat 20 a stealth check to scout ahead in a cave and kill off four guys before he sets off the alarms. There was a new fear of mimes instilled in that group that day.
Aidan, The Half-Elf Bard, ladies man, keeper of hearts, woe of fathers, joy to mothers, keeper of lore, sexiest man alive(self proclaimed). this guy...managed to essentially pull off the Harem no Jutsu from Naruto... and seduced the BBEG. He would flirt with the enemy in combat, and would do everything he could to Shame enemies to death. Vicious Mockery or go home.
I once played a Grizzly Bear Paladin that had gone Deadpool level of insanity because when his goddess (Melora) gave him setience she inadvertently exposed him to raw asteral power of the universe itself frying his brain like a couple of eggs. As a result very loyal to his party, very prone to drinking, breaking the forth wall, making healing potions from holy water infused wine, he often ate his enemies (It's not cannabilsm if there not the same species) and he invented both morphine and dynamite. He later died kamakzing a dragon to save the party
Actually He was the single worst DM I ever had. He was incredibly manipulative, verbally abusive, controlling to the point of basically giving us scripts that if we didn't fallow what he wanted us to he would basically throw temper tantrums. The reason my I killed my character was to leave his campaign. A week later two more players took there characters out of his game, and we started playing a different campaign.
One character I enjoyed a lot was a super character known as "The Glitch", who was always putting a glitch in the villain's schemes. The background was a DnD2e Lich that a Paladin put a Belt of Reversing Alignment on and punted into a portal. The Glitch had to use a permanent illusion to keep folks from seeing its skeletal self and knew that removing the belt would be an evil act and thus to be avoided.
I once made a wizard. Except it was actually a rogue con-man pretending to be a wizard to fraud the team of adventurers. I made full use of the "whisper" function with the DM, since we were on roll20. I then promptly sold the quest item, and derailed the quest by telling the other players the merchant was a thief, and that the quest giver was a psycho. I lasted all of 3 hours before the DM realized he couldn't handle this and just told me the thieve's guild had assassinated my character, and to make another character. Twas the best 3 hours I played in any game.
I made a character for GURPS once who was a stage magician who had Cowardice as a disadvantage and womanizer as a quirk. Cowardice was basically worth a good amount of disadvantage points because my character had to do everything in his power not to get into physical danger. But he was a stage magician, no spells or anything, he did stuff like pull a coin from behind your ear, or card tricks. So the other guys were like combatants or whatever, and it turned out to actually be a huge advantage because he would do things like interpose the other players between him and danger, and use tricks to disappear from sight and run away. So these stacked, dangerous fights would break out, he would get to safety and find ways to steal stuff or get NPC's killed fighting the "monster" or whatever. And then he would use his charisma to smooth things over
Splutnik the Sewer Rat, a goblin artificer who made his artificer creations out of shit. He wore old cookware as armor, used a shovel as a dagger and had a burlap bag of crap that he carried around with him so he could fashion his creations.
Cool idea. I had my friends play a short goblin campaign and their first task was to take a cart from a shed on a farm. My alchemist goblin packed his pouch full of poo and climbed the house. The others accidently made noise because of the horse. So the farmer released his dog. Shortly after the farmer came out to be hit by a flaming alchemical poo bomb. :)
The weirdest character I have played in my rather limited experience playing was a Rock Gnome Druid who was a little less than sane. At the start of combat, he would throw one of his small tinker toys at the enemy and then when he watched them break and fall on the ground in front of them he would accuse them of killing it. Which spiralled into a Wild Shape and him eating their face. Only to rebuild them and repeat the cycle all over again. Was comical roleplaying his freak outs.
Sounds like you guys had some awesome crazy characters wandering through your campaigns :). Personally, when it comes to crazy characters, three come to mind: 1) Thermidor the Magnificent, Scourge of Vermin. Also known as 'sprinkles' to those he was disinclined to employ evocation spells against, Thermidor was a cat who'd been a wizard's pet at one point and had, through the old wizard's experimentation with spells, effectively been hit by a supercharged version of the Awaken spell. Being a cat, he immediately decided with his now 18 (at lvl. 1!) Int score that he was too good to stick around as a pet and was going to rule the world for himself. He didn't get very far, but there were good moments all the same, especially since being a cat makes it extraordinarily easy to blend into an urban environment. 2) The Electric Lemur Imperium. Haven't gotten to play this one yet, but basically the Imperium is a group of five clockwork lemurs equipped with musical instruments who together are one bard, sharing spell slots and such the way hags in a coven would. Having escaped from an alchemical laboratory, each lemur would have a different 'caricatured' personality, with a different one in charge of the group's actions on each day. 3) Bartleby. A truly infernal creation, Bartleby was a doddering, 400-year-old, hopelessly senile forest Gnome warlock of Cthulhu, with an alignment that quite literally read “chaotic amnesiac” and a magical item known as a “Beard of Holding,” filled with an inventory that was random-rolled completely from the 5e PHB item tables. Basically, he was once a great and powerful warlock who was bent on world domination, but his plans were foiled, his association with the Great Old One drove him insane, then senile, and he now spent his days wandering about town mumbling to himself, sitting in a rocking chair on the porch of his hobbit house, and lovingly tending to his garden. Gentle, gullible, and prone to completely misidentifying any and every situation he came across, Bartleby would seem pretty harmless at first. He wasn't. In the first three sessions in the campaign that I played him in, his main quest was to get milk, since he'd run out at home. Of course, the town was under siege by the cult of the dragon queen, but hey, he needed the milk. In the process of getting it, he killed several looting cultists who he believed merely to be insolent youths, blew up an alchemists' shop with the result that around twenty kobolds in the vicinity got high as a kite off of the fumes and perceived him as their new glorious leader, and then led said kobolds in burning down about 60% of the town in the chaos until they eventually found a general store. Those kobolds were later all equipped with musical instruments and became the party's (rather incompetent) pep band as the adventure went on, while another member of the party (some kind of small sea-elf) eventually took up permanent residence in Bartleby's beard.
2nd edition. The DM mentioned a previous campaign with a different group that featured a Jester type Bard whose weapon was a rubber chicken with a vorpal beak
My craziest character is a Half-Orc Arcane Trickster Rogue named Grog The Unseeable. He was originally based off of some silly tumblr meme about a guy who played a rogue that instead of stealthing would just intimidate his foes. (It went something like: "YOU NO SEE GROG!!!" "I can't see you! I can't see you!"). This of course is a pretty lame character concept in practice, especially in a group like mine that roleplays quite a bit. So I gave him a backstory, became an Arcane Trickster to augment his sneaking abilities with magic. Then once we started playing, I basically became the comic relief character. I had entered the campaign late, my friends started in on a road trip I couldn't join in on. So I decided to just act like a silly side character. I helped them on their quest in ridiculous ways like blowing stuff up with barrels of homemade alcohol, gave him a thick Russian accent in broken commmon and third person since I couldn't really pull off a normal gruff orc sounding one, and in general just acted like that crazy friend. It gets better though. Our DM is a little sassy and would sometimes make comments at Grog's expense, so at one point he said something at Grog and I acted out hearing some disembodied voice with Grog refers to as "Sky Voice". Its just become part of the game and mow we've got this plan to homebrew a Warlock of the DM if Grog dies so Sky Voice will bring him back as a servant. He's my favorite to play.
A character I have yet to be able to play is a Bard who is literally a mime. Dip a bit into The Old One Warlock for telepathy, and use a lot of minor illusions to give his performances sound, instead of having an instrument for his bardic inspiration he just mimics banging a marching band drum and adds the sound through illusions. Also a bard who's bardic instrument is a one man band Also, one character that is psionically linked twins. Too many fun ideas, not enough time
I've only made one unusual character. He was a bard who thought he was a wizard. He eventually went to this meeting of wizards that another character was going to, at the meeting my character convinced some of the most powerful wizards and convinced them that he created a new form of arcane magic based off music theory. By the end of that campaign my bard had spread word of his deeds far across the lands and was thought of as the most powerful wizard of the century by the common man. Our group was split between the actual wizard and our paladin (planned split) my character went with the paladin and the fate of the realm was decided between a magic duel between the two most powerful wizards, mine and the other player. Our DM stopped the campaign when our characters finished discussing the terms and conditions of the dule, for example a condition was who ever won would be the new commander of our keep. We never played out the duel and my friends and I keep questioning who won the duel.
My craziest character was a warlock that was actually crazy due to PTSD from his background as a solider. Trapped behind enemy lines of orc war bands his squad was killed and only him and his best friend survived for days hiding in a pit of dead soldiers when his friend was caught trying to steal food. He was tourched and killed. Then beheaded with his head tossed by him. He then started hearing the skull speak to him. It was the Old Ones guiding him to safety. The skull became his focus and he spoke to it often. He spent most of his time trying to convince the party to not kill major villains like necromancers because he convinced them to surrender if they served his needs. He was truly LE. However he was reluctant to do the evil acts, he did them out of a feeling of obligation because his patron saved his life.
Here's a crazy character concept for 5E: the 14,000-15,000 year old Druid. The build is this: start with an Wood Elf, and have it become a Half-Dragon. Then, get it up to level 18. Elves live 700-750 years, being a half-dragon doubles that, to 1,400-1,500 years. Then, add the level 18 druid ability, Timeless body, which slows the aging rate to 1/10 the normal rate, meaning this character now lives 14,000-15,000 years!
I had a halfling that got addicted to hallucinogens (Black Lotus Poppies or some such)... and he began to worship a chaotic neutral god of madness. He was a multi-class Ranger 2 Cleric 4 Thief 8 who was basically out of his gourd most of the time. Against a dragon (youg adult) with the rest of his party... his weapons were basically crap, so he used his boots of striding and springing to do a flying headbutt on the dragon and he rolled a natural crit. The DM ruled that the dragon only took 2 points of damage since my character wasn't wearing headgear, but she also fell to the floor laughing after my character was laid out unconscious with a severe knot on his noggin. The rest of the group didn't know what to make of the situation until the dragon told them to sheath their weapons. The dragon had said it was the funniest thing she'd ever seen and agreed to let us go after they explained why they'd attacked her. I think she became my character's lover... but was never really sure though... he was kinda prone to "fits of creative whimsy" and the hallucinogens practically guaranteed that he never quite figure it out. Or why his invisible horse never ate. Or why his bag of holding kept throwing up. Or...well um...yeah... Cheers.
My craziest character that I want to play is Ser Toppenbottom, he is a bard and is actually two gnomes sitting on one anothers shoulders with crazy high deception that they use to convince everyone they are one singular entity. No DM I have had yet has let me play Ser Toppenbottom... It makes me very sad.
One character I want to play at some day is a drow celestial pact warlock. He thought he was making a fiend pact, and went through the contract with a fine toothed comb looking for fine print that would screw him, but forgot to check whether the angel he was dealing with was actually fallen. Now he’s bound to a patron that is trying to reform him against his wishes.
Shump Ironrod, Halfling Barbarian. Was abducted by Orcs who mistook him for a human child, planned to fatten him up and eat him. He didn't get any larger though, so they made him their slave, and then mascot. He was eventually "rescued" when the Orc tribe was slain, but became an adventure because he honestly believed that he was an Orc, and thus didn't reintegrate back into society very well. He wore warpaint, rode a boar, and acted like a stereotypical Barbarian, albeit pint-sized and possessed of a massive napoleon-complex.
The mention of the gnome with the fishbowl reminds me of something my brother once mentioned happened in a game - the Fishbowl of Holding in which the party carried Flipper, the dolphin.
I once played in a d20 Modern campaign based in the Mortal Kombat universe. I played a wereboar named BOARden Ramsay. He was a greasy biker type (he rode a HOG) who dressed kind of like Fonzie, had a bizarre hybrid Southern-New York accent, and carried his signature triple-barrel shotgun that had a giant "switchblade" mechanic in the stock so it could double as a kind of glaive when out of ammo.
My oddest character back in Pathfinder was a Monk all about movement. He moved faster than almost anything in the campaign, lol. He ran off with the big bad's McGuffin device at the end like the Flash. 😄
I LOVE to make characters that are "different", I have been playing a demon lord in a campaign for the past few weeks....or rather an avatar of a demon lord. I also really like the tick thing you guys were talking about, that sounds pretty cool.
played a gnome illusionist whose only damaging spell was magic missile. got dropped into a sort of 1v1 battle tournament thing which, for someone with not a lot of damage potential, was quite the problem. ended up fighting a paladin, really goody two shoes kind of guy. what do i do? i make everything he's wearing invisible and just kept showing him random scenes of him having sex with whatever till he conceded out of embarrasment
i did not create this character concept, but i figured that i would throw it on here anyway, its a pathfinder build. (Drunken brute 1 / Ninja ??) starting as a drunken brute give the drunken rage theme for the character, and as he lvs he begins to unlock his latent Ki, sometimes becoming so drunk that he uses shadow clones, but just thinks he is seeing double. Also other ki powers would be under the context of the alcohol giving him liquid confidence.
I played a Bard Kenku (bird person), but Kenku weren't a 'usual' race in the DMs world, so her backstory was that she was actually a human who was cursed into being a crow, and then the attempt to turn her back to normal screwed up. She had a Jug of Alchemy, which can produce various substances once a day (a couple gallons of water, a couple ounces of honey, etc). We were fighting a powerful wizard who was using Improved Invisibility; my bard threw 40 gallons of mayo in her general direction. It was amazing.
my favorite part of DMing is creating tons of unique NPCs for the party to encounter. My favorite so far is an older rock gnome inventor named Fnipper Ningle Alston Doxenborough III. He talks fast, is extremely friendly, has no concept of personal space, and while brilliant, is a little off his rocker. I paired him with his blacksmith partner, an intimidating dwarf who's missing an arm and only speaks in grunts. The dichotomy made for some very entertaining moments.
I was playing a Pathfinder game where firearms were in the world, and I was playing a gnome gunslinger who was completely crazy except for when he had a gun in his hand which made for some great role-playing.
Not mine, but a friend once made some joke classes for 3.5 DnD: the martial Ridiculist and its spellcasting counterpart, the Prepostomancer. He eventually ran a game set in the planes, and someone was actually allowed to roll a Ridiculist. It was quite an experience. They mostly had a bunch of crazy abilities that allowed them to use stats in ways they weren't supposed to be used (for instance, he could use STR instead of INT for intelligence checks, but only if he shouted "MY MUSCLES TELL ME" in character before revealing whatever knowledge he gained), though they also had "very exotic weapon proficiency," which allowed them to gain proficiency in something that wasn't supposed to be a weapon (and I think granted some bonuses to wielding it). He rolled dice with pictures on them gathered from various board games to determine his starting equipment, which was mostly a bunch of random weapons and ammunition, some firewood, etc., but it also included a dwarven pirate and an elven ninja. He chose to be proficient in *people,* and dual wielded the pirate and ninja (the ninja was keen!). His "weapons" started out alive, but we never healed them so they died within a few combats. He kept wielding them, and would also occasionally grapple enemies and wield them as weapons. Strangely enough, it fit in pretty well since the planes were already pretty wacky.
I once had a Sprite warlock, pact of the chain that had a familiar that was another Sprite. I never made it clear but I often eluded to it either being me, a family member, or my spouse. It was kinda messed up but a lot of fun
I once played an elf in a custom campaign named Yzarc. He had a split personality disorder. The second personality always came into play when combat started and remained there until he drank water. The second personality, which was only called "Crazy" by the players, loved violence and chaos. So he often stole things while Crazy and returned them as Yzarc. In the end of the campaign, Yzarc turned out to be the weaker personality (hint: read "Yzarc" backwards) that was being controlled by Crazy, who turned out to be the demon general of Chaos who, ultimately, was the boss right before the final campaign boss. It was pretty epic and I got to play my first crazy character. Since then I only play crazy ones, who still go into combat, but make idiotic decisions whenever they can ^^
Got a player in one of my games who made Natsu Dragneel in 5e. Zariel Tiefling Dragonblood Sorcerer. All fire spells, with Flames of Phlegeos, Tavern Brawler, and Elemental Adept - Fire feats. He's absolutely awesome.
had a player play an oakling fire druid, where his body was chard from fire, hated humans, and had never ending oneliners but he always was just saying them like the oakling didn't understand his quick comments were comical. Was farming these mushrooms that would grow on one side of him. his catch phrase was a deep chuckle, " oak, oak, oak, oak"
My favorite character was a wild magic sorcerer with multiple personalities that I co-played with a friend. We switched who controlled the character every time one of us rolled a one or a twenty. We also stipulated that the conversation between the players also occurred in character. I remember one conversation in combat where we argued about whether or not to use fireball. Our turns had a time limit so needless to say we spent the entire combat encounter arguing with ourself.
When I was played D&D 5th for the first time, my character, while not what I'd call "crazy" but he was certainly a little...unorthodox. I named him Sanders and I decided to play as a Rouge since they were easy to play as and offered more versatility to the than a fighter. I the chose the Assassin subclass and specialised in dual weilding and equiped him with throwing knives and fire grenades and had him be skilled in stealth and acrobatics. As for the race...I picked Dargonborn. So the sum up, my charachter was basically 6ft tall, scaly, deal weilding, knife trowing, baddass dressed in black with the agility of a ninja and a built-in flamethrower to boot.
I think one of my favorite characters was Vain, a 3rd edition Rog/Clr anti-hero. He was a LE character in an otherwise all good aligned group, and the only character capable of detecting alignments. I had the other players convinced Vain was cursed, because all his summons were devils.
We went through the tomb of horrors with throw away characters that we rolled 3d6 for each stat straight down. First roll is strength, second is dex, etc. Mine was a bard that I optimized for a spy game rather than an intense dungeon crawl. He lasted about half the tomb, and everyone else lost about 4 characters each at about that time.
Timber Nine claws. My favorite was and is a low 8 intelligence Alchemist Tabaxi. Always second guessing himself and always checking his notes. I frequently used the tabaxi table to see what he was interested in at the time, because like all cats his interest is ever changing. "Open the door please, nah i dont wanna go in." I used the dawnforgedcast alchemist multiclassed with monk. He was a student at a monestary but he always got bullied because he was so small and weak, so after years of research, which is slow because of low intelligence, he finally summised a potion to make himself taller and stronger. Any time somebody would mention size he would always make sure that people understood that he was "tall" and "strong" with 8 strength :D My way of explaining his capabilities as an alchemist was that he was bad at inventing stuff, but good at following notes and recipes, so his way of inventing new recipes was to mix random ingredients and note them down, incase he needed to recreate it later, and then drink it. Which regularly would resolve in him turning in to a monster, metamorph from the class, going from Doctor Jekyll into mister Hide. He was also a character I made to test a multiclass build, trying to make as fast a character as possible. So far he has managed to have a speed of 720Ft in one round running or 1000Ft in a round, depending on how you calculate it. 30 + 10(monk)+10(longstrider)+10(mobile feat), movement, action dash, step of the wind dash, extra dash action (haste potion) quadruple/triple speed (haste + Feline agility).
I've always wanted to create a fully rng character. Rolled stats, rolled race, rolled class, rolled background, etc. See what the dice comes up with. 😄
I just made a tiefling artificer (dipping into warlock and wizard for extra firepower, literally) that sings a modified version of "Hellfire" from the Hunchback of Notre Dame whenever he goes into combat, and starts casually blasting fire and bullets. Aptly calling himself Hellfire, because of course. "HellFIRE! *bang* Dark FIRE! *Fwoosh*" Hehehe. I never got the chance to play him, but I also at one point made a dragonborn fighter that was raised by halflings.
Lord Pookie-Wookums, Bringer of Pies and Death. Orc Bard-Barian, who's fighting style was throwing his pies at people. He was also a Noble of Waterdeep, a famous singer, and novelist.
One of my players is a human pact of the blade warlock who is obsessed with cleaning and uses his awesome powers to summon a mop that he uses for murder and tidying up. He also made his pact with a unicorn, and has a unicorn tramp stamp.
I like odd combos like a Teifling Redemption Paladin who struggles with his nature. A half orc tribal bard drummer. A human fighter who has a few barbarian levels just to mechanically reflect his personal anguish and frustration rather than barbarian traditions. He's just become a tavern brawler essentially. 👍 Making these work RP wise is more fun than min/maxing for me.
Kyrus Fel'Tongue, a Tiefling Monk who used magic hairbands in his hair (which took the form of bandages) to be able to make his hair whip his enemies. This with Monk made for very crazy and wacky combinations of attack, seeing Flurry of Blows and using a second strike as a bonus action.
I had an Eladrin Wildmage Spellsword, who was totally mentally unhinged, played by my brother. Even his backstory was that he was found walking naked through a city, blowing marshmallow bubbles (basically summoning food) with each breath. Because we had so few players, the DMPC was in the party, and was in charge of keeping the Wildmage under control.
Had a catfolk rogue in pathfinder that had a ball of yarn named frank, frank used to get tossed at enemies in battle to help out. the rogue also liked to steal candy from fat people, since they didnt "need" it. Also had an elf ranger with amnesia, had dwarfs as favored enemy, and hated them without knowing why. He also colected socks from fallen enemies.
Probably my favorite was in Pathfinder as a half-elven lost girl summoner turned cannibal while raised by a displacer beast. As she grew into her power, she summoned forth an Eidolon that resembled a displacer beast named Dio. She was more like a wild beast than a trained mage, and had no concept of civilization or law. Also, only spoke Elven and Sylvan. So it was fun to play :) Gotta give props to the GM for dealing with that situation. I ended up driving our trigger happy fireballer mage into madness where he developed an intense fear of tentacles. My first encounter with the party was while they had set up an ambush, all hiding in different bushes. My character noticed the mage, as he had horrible stealth. Dio grabbed him with the tentacles and blinked away with him. Then he point blank fireballed Dio and I. He narrowly escaped, as did I. Eventually I helped them ambush the thing they were waiting for, and joined them. I learned Common from the group, and referred to the fire mage as "Food" for the duration of his life. Until he went mad and turned on the party. Eventually, she did eat him in the end. Well cooked by his own fire.
I'm having fun with a NPC Alehouse Drake, from the Tome of Beasts, who's alcholism fuels his powers and smart ass attitude. Also, while not the character himself, my Warlock of Hastur accidentally created a cult of well groomed Gnolls who are now roaming the underdark like door to door evangelists.
I rolled up Alok Maarg, Troll Slayer. Only one complication. He had an innate and severe fear of fire, so his preferred weapon of choice was something bladed. Of course when he made his living slaying Trolls, and was unable to use fire at all, that made for interesting role playing.
My favorite 3.5 character was a half Dwarf, half Ogre. He was large and had a 10ft reach, but since he was part dwarf, we decided he was ‘only’ around 6 1/2 ft tall. So he was basically built like a gorilla with super long arms that came to his knees. He was a grappler who just pummeled people with brass knuckles and threw his pet rock (a 150lb Boulder) at people. Favorite 5e character: Great Old One warlock who made a pact with Cthulhu, but she’s a crazy cat lady, so to her it’s Cathulhu, and she believes she will eventually be turned into a cat. She talks to these otherworldly voices that speak to her, as well as full on conversations with animals, (thank you speak with animals at will) as well as clapping and giggling when bad people are set on fire, eviscerated, etc, so even though she is only about 4’8” everyone is terrified of her. It also helps that she has a +9 to intimate. 😆
I played a kobald sorcerer who had tied scorpions to the end of his staff and lashed it about. He didn't talk aside from some grunts and barks and when he started to get stressed he would (try to) eat whatever small objects we're in arms reach.
Goblin alchemist "patches", covered head to toe in a dirty ratty robe. mount is war pig named bacon. Infinite bacon ration via regen. Eventually built a goblin mushroom brewery conglomerate via hireling hijinks and leadership skills. Used goblin hirelings to spring traps. Disquise used to make people think he was a dirty smelly halfling. Lots of pockets potions and utility. Big thing was his trusty boomstick. Ran this in pathfinder.
a friend in AD&D played a half-orc fright/rogue with low int called "IHAK" (I Have A Knife) this way of robing someone was talk up to them and draw a 2 handed sword and put it to the person's neck.
My greatest was a goblin alchemist with 3 distinct personalities. Gave each of them social, exploration, and combat triggers that would give them DM a mechanic to make my character flip to another personality; for example, one was arachnophobic, another hated heights, etc. Pathfinder/3.5. DM allowed me different builds for each one. First, NG, grenadier, timid but always on edge. Second, CN, vivesectionist, was much cockier and standoffish. And then the 3rd was built on the NPC warrior class, but he believed he was a paladin. Believed his torch was his divine mace. Played the 'paladin' as far over-the-top as i could.
Oh boy, my craziest player character i've seen as a dm is Marshall Law, the tiefling elemental lighting sorceror. He was basically a sorceror cowboy with a revolver made of enchanted glass. He got his powers from a lightning dragon that killed his family and took his legs. He wore prosthetics and eventually got magical metal ones that could summon an iron golem im the form of a warhorse. He was also basically from fantasy Australia
DM 5e Question: I have a player looking to take the Retainer feature as part of a custom background. She understands they are non-combatants that won't follow her into dangerous situations, but wants to know what skills if any that can have. She is looking to reimagine them as her family, a husband and two teenage kids, that she travels with and provides for. I think it is cool, but I don't know how skilled they can be before they become a major advantage for her character and unbalance the game for my other players.
Hmm, by virtue of giving them any skills, they become unbalanced. They're basically NPCs that the player can narratively interact with for RP and extra sets of hands for carrying things. Anything beyond that makes the feature too good. That being said, I've used the Retainer feature with two PCs and really enjoyed myself under the described parameters. -Nerdarchist Ryan
This is an awesome Idea, you have a great player there! To answer your questions, The "retainers" are said to be commoners in the text of the Background feature. This isn't meant as flavor, those are the actual game mechanics. Commoners(MM p.345) basically have 10 in each stat, no skill proficiencies and are CR0, so you don't need to worry about game balance. The reason these retainers don't follow into dangerous situations is because they are so weak, having only 4HP... Now, if this seems underwhelming for you and/or your player, you can reward her creativity by giving these retainers a slight bump over the standard commoners. You could give each of them a single skill in which they are proficient and give them a proficiency bonus half that of the PC character they are tied to. This way, they aren't secondary characters, they don't outshine any PC, but they have a bit more interest to them other than the RP. If that's not enough, I guess you can also add one or both of the following Ideas: 1- The retainers gain 1HP per Level of the PC they are tied to. 2- Instead of all 10s for stats, the retainers use an array weaker than the standard array for PC characters. I'd go for: 14, 13, 12, 10, 8, 7 While these modifications might make her retainers more powerful than the standard commoner, I don't believe any or even all of them make enough of a difference to worry about game balance. They have no weapon proficiencies, incredibly low HP and only OK stats. What they do however is reward your player for her creativity and allow her to customize her "family"! Hope this helps!
The weirdest build I've had was sprung from neccesity, rather than on purpose. I played Gwenneth Graymirin the rock Gnome bard, who had invented the saxophone and was looking for adventure out of spite, and wasn't really built for the stress of saving the world, but she managed gracefully. The issue was that because of how the team was set up, she ended up having to carry it on multiple different fronts. She acted as the team healer, wizard, rougue, and even sometimes had to use her unusually good strength to get past obsticals the fighters couldnt. All without ever multiclassing. Just a combination of bardic magics and her size and items. She was so busy having to do the work of 4 other classes, she hardly had time to bard at all. It became a running joke, me being the rougueclericwizbard.
I had a strange character idea Name: Billy bongos Class: bard (obviously) Race: human He believes he is the God of bongos and can give boons to people the thing is those boons are completely useless Boon of companionship: you can summon bongos at times of need Boon of strongos: you gain advantage on all strength checks that involve bongos such as lifting really heavy bongos or hitting bongos really hard Boon of ultimate bongo power: you now have the ability to turn into a bongo with arms and legs
My craziest Combo was with a Halfling Bard and a Goliath Sorcerer. We came across a hydra in the story before, and so the halfling was able to polymorth into it. Me, as the goliath, picked him up, threw him above our enemies, where he turned into a hydra and I cast enlarge on him.... Oh the fun times of a huge 3x3 squares hydra with 5 heads falling onto our enemies.
I've played a Dwarf Transmutation wizard in Pathfinder who was covered in magic tattoos, shaved his head, and chose to smash things in the face with his axe after buffing himself up with magic. He refused to use any "normal" spells for damage like fireball. Instead he would cast Ghost Sound specifically to have a chorus of screams follow him into battle to unnerve his opponents, or stuff like hydraulic push, but colored blood red. He used the blood of his enemies to create the magic inks for his tattoos. His spellbook was made from the skins of his strongest enemies. When that campaign finished, someone asked me what his alignment was because they were curious, and I told them from day one he was just Chaotic Awesome, I hadn't really considered an alignment other than chaotic-something. My favorite is my Dwarf hobo who was a thief/fighter that I've recreated in several editions. He's based off the dwarf from the D&D movie with Marlon Wayans in it, and a lot of Danny Devito as Frank Reynolds. He's a crude, gross, slob of a Dwarf who was cast out of his homeland for being crude, gross, and a slob. He's a cowardly scavenger who will do anything to survive. Even when he became rich from his schemes, he chose to live like a hobo. He would almost never be attacked by enemies because he looked like someone's slave, so he would take advantage and stab them in the back with some dirty knife that was covered in filth and disease. His main goals were getting laid, getting drunk, getting even, and eating as much as he could.
I wanted to do a half drow sword sage who fought with a kama and a silk rope. His whole thing would be to incapacitate enemies while others killed them or to use it to choke out enemies with a noose.
I haven't played often enough to have anything actually played out. But I do have the idea of if I were to DM having a mimic merchant somewhere in my world
I really want to make a Dragonborn Druid that is like the movie Big, but turned up to 11. He was actually born a halfling, but when he was ten, he fell out of a tree and died. A friend of the family cast reincarnate on him, growing him a new, adult body. So instead of being a 2'5" halfling child, he's now a 6'4" adult Dragonborn. I'd even make his arcane focus a halfling slingstaff to evoke the "kid with a slingshot" imagery. He'd end up an adventurer after running away from his mom when she tried to tell him what to do ("he's a grown-up now!"). And being a kid, he'd get lost and not know how to get back home.
Alexandretta Ghedris, level 8 Mastermind Rogue/2 GoO Warlock. This character started as 2 lock / 1 rogue, using mask of many faces and actor to hide her identity. She started play as the secretary type assistant to our group's fighter noble. Using subtle magic, masterful infiltration, and scheming behind the scenes with the DM, i was able to convince the group that my class was Wizard for the first few levels, and they never really questioned it since i had a few spell slots and basically only used cantrips to fight. I made the king of a country obsessively paranoid behind my group's back. I killed off his allies by framing them, often right in front of my group's noses. I sent missives to foreign kings, who invaded at the end of this character's arc. Alone in the throne room, my group set up their defenses. They cast their spells, and drew their swords. Suddenly, the king fell dead. My knife in his back. As the group asked why i did that, i removed the mask of many faces, revealing my identity as the daughter of the former queen whom he had executed for infidelity. I then activated my ring of invisibility, and they never saw me again. The king mysteriously couldn't be resurrected, and all of my notes were found detailing my every betrayal. Now, somewhere in a neighboring country, there is a tiny library in a little town, run by a kindly old mage. Sitting on the front desk is a tiny silver cage, a small mote of purple light glimmering within...
I just built a Udine summoner that was a slave on a ship who fell overboard and mad a pact with an under water creature to survive. Not quite to the lvl of these characters but I'm working my way to it.
I kind of want to make a Barbarian with Tavern Brawler who cannot bring himself to use any weapon properly. So I'd do something like throw my greataxe, grapple the target as a bonus action, and then use them as my weapon for the rest of the encounter. Similar thing could be done with a Rogue. You steal something off of the enemy and beat them to death with it.
I played a superhero called Captain Heineken... could fly by but had to shriek "Only Heineken can do this", stretching powers by uttering "Heineken reaches the parts others can't reach", had the power to turn part of the blood of everyone on a 30 yard radius to Heineken so every fight was a drunken brawl... Budweiser acted as his kryptonite... he was in a team that consisted of and invisible, deaf and mute telepath, someone who could make 10 copies of their below "average NPC", someone how had frost and fire powers, but was vulnerable to fire and frost damage, Doctor Default who had no skills but his attributes were so his his default scores were good enough and Doctor Profile who's power was he was just likeable and could talk everyone out of their criminal ways
I created a gnome who wished to be a great wizard but learned all his magic on his own. He has a random spell feature that can negatively effect his team or be really powerful
I'm DMing a 3.5e game right now full of weird and interesting characters.
One is a warforged monk who spent most of his 720 years buried in a collapsed cavern. he had many years to meditate and has a lot of wisdom, but he has no actual experience with anything. he once wandered away from a battle because he saw a bee and wondered aloud "how does it even fly with those little wings?"
another character was a human werewolf who never turned into a werewolf because he was afraid of persecution. so he spent most of his time as the weakest character until he finally used his werewolf form in a tough battle against a large bullette. the only problem was he transformed right after the bullette died, so he revealed his secret for no reason.
another was a half nymph character who couldn't decide if she wanted to be a two weapon melee rogue or a long range archer rogue. so she spent most of the time running back and forth from melee range to long range and climbing trees. she hardly ever attacks.
another is a dwarf fighter who's nickname is stinky. he is constantly trying to get himself killed because the player wants to roll a new character. but it turns out that all of the crazy, suicidal, stuff he does to try to die (diving down the throat of the bullette. he didn't know bulletes don't like dwarf) ends up saving the party or becoming a turning point in a battle that isn't going well. the dice always favor him in those situations.
there is a lizardfolk barbarian who generally does almost half the total damage in battles by himself, but he's all depressed and thinks he is weak because he never actually lands any finishing blows. so he is constantly looking for anything he can find to make himself stronger. he also continually forgets to use his rage.
then there is the (blue)dragonborn rogue who has a very high intelligence. she has so many skill points that she basically makes the other rogues obsolete. she also has a lightning breath weapon that wreaks havoc in battles and ends up hitting the dwarf fighter at least half the time. she's also extremely shy and spends most non battle encounters hiding behind the lizardman.
Lastly there is the character I ran as the DM back when it was just me and 2 players who didn't know how to play. he was a Goliath under 3.5 rules so he had more str, more hit dice, and was able to use large size weapons due to a feat. but he barely spoke common and took everything anybody said as 100% literal and he was brutally honest, even in situations were honesty would get you killed. so generally he was told to not speak (a good way for the DMs character to not become the party crutch.) so one time the dwarf was threatening a member of the kings guard and said "back off or you'll get a foot up your ass!" (again the dwarf trying to die) and obviously the guard did not back off. half way through the ensuing battle, the Goliath had that guard bent over and was shoving his size 42 foot up the guards ass, who was in turn begging the dwarf to end his life. once we got more players to the game the Goliath left for his own adventures, only to show up for the occasional visit from time to time.
I...want... to... play...at... you... TABLE!!! lmao!
But seriously, sounds like the best game ever. weird characters seem to make the best characters.
My craziest D&D character: Level 1, Human Wizard, 18 years old. He came from a middle class family, with both of his parents and both of his siblings still alive, and the family owned a mapmaking shop that he was working in part time, and was in line to inherit one day. No family issues, no mental illness, no traumatic childhood. He was just a kid. Crazy, huh?
Nice!
My friend created her first charater in a simillar fashion, in short time she became jelaous of all the character plots we got because of our ritcher backstories and asked the DM if she could flash the character out.
Impossible. That can’t be a real character! Did his mom make a pact with a demon that gives him demonic powers at least?
Oh boy what a wonderous house of cards you build for your DM to destroy in cruel and unusual way just to get you in a story hook.
Best Character Award!
The all time greatest character I've played so far was in 5E. Magikarp, the Splashing. He was a Circle of the Moon druid, and he would refuse to Wild Shape into anything other than fish and sharks and whatnot, regardless of the water available. My greatest kill was from jumping above an enemy and turning into an orca.
Username checks out?
Should be PC Walrus
You realise that an orca is a mammal, not a fish, right?
František Vrána "and whatnot" probably meant to include any water animal.
My mistake.
My friend was playing a character who opened every door he found (just to piss of the dm who was that guy when he played) and finally the dm got tired of it and behind this particular door he put a zombie ogre. So the player and ogre looked at each other for a moment, the dwarf did the classic I'm in the wrong place wave and closed the door. We asked him what was going on. While struggling to hold the door closed replies with, "Nothing", like nothing was happening. Then he suddenly releases the door. Ogre fails a dex save. The player the charges into the room screaming "THE DWARVES ARE UPON YOU!", in dwarvish (IRL!) and attempts to grapple it. Nat 20... tackles it to the ground so we surround it attacking. All the while he's nailing the strength rolls to keep it on the ground until we kill it in 3 rounds. Needless to say my favorite moment playing so far.
Homebrew world. Goblin Paladin named Jaxegazy. His "god" Skavishga was a voice in his head who had told him to help protect the city. To do so he would bang the tin cup of his mess kit with the spoon, randomly chant, sing, dance, and do everything in his power to attract enemies.
The most epic moment was when he and the party had been tracking some goblins who had run away and we heard voices around the corner in the road. Jax immediately ran around the corner of the road, saw a bunch of orcs slaughtering the goblins we had been chasing and promptly pulled a Han Solo in the Death Star style about face.
Unfortunately, just recently Jaxegazy died because a ghost who was possessing an ally screamed at him, Jax failed his save and immediately aged 40 years....becoming the first goblin in any D&D game I've ever played to die of old age.
Eldmirst the faded; easily my most fun role playing experience ever.
Back story was an arch made who discovered a means of time travel. As he research was progressing, he quickly garnered the attention of the underdark and malicious forces of the omniverse. Struggling to keep his research out of their hands, he decided this power was not suitable for academic endeavors and didn't want it replicated by others. He destroyed all his work, his books, his lab and finally tried to focus a mind wipe on himself.
Thus, Eldmirst the faded was a 3rd level sorcerer, who was bananas insane. He carried a mailbox he insisted was his familiar. He was constantly jabbering on about intrigues with the divine courts love affairs (referencing his past time as a romance novelist), while talking to his true familiar, a small rat that did his best to keep him out of trouble. Eldmirst changed his familiars name frequently, but scuttles is the most common. The general consensus was that he, in his long life, knew these spells intrinsically, and was casting them via muscle memory.
Third session in, we went back to Aulbrim, Where 357 Murltes Ln. (The mail box's address) was located, and when the party saw the cratered husk of an arch mage's wizard tower, the expressions on everyone's faces were priceless. From there, the DM wove pieces of backstory I insisted on not knowing through the storyline.
It was a lot of fun, Eldmirst the faded never died when the group went separate ways, so I like to think he's still roaming the streets.
we encountered bag of devouring. I named it Tina, she was my friend and I fed her my dinner scraps, as well as all of the bodies that we needed to dispose of. I miss Tina.
The catapult t rex reminded me of a character concept my friends and I made
Goliath Strength Ranger.
Weapon of choice: small humanoids (dead or alive), especially his druid halfling buddy
Goliath casts lightning arrow/conjure volley, throws Halfling buddy as an improvised weapon. Halfling transforms into an elephant/mammoth midair.
Hilarity ensues.
There is a 3.5 Prestige class called the Hulking Hurler. Literally, your one and only job is to throw big objects at the enemy. You need to be at least Large to gain entry though.
Reminds me of the NPC Jovian (Bastards and Bloodlines half-giant) fighter my party came across, named I'i (read Eeeee). Had a massive sword and throwing rocks... or throwing whatever. He wasn't very bright, but not stupid, either. The problem was that he had been raised by goblins infected with infernal taint, who had taught him all sorts of erroneous things to keep him feeling dumb and inadequate. So, for example, he firmly believed that rocks loved to fly toward bad people to hug them, maybe even to death if they didn't straighten up. He was also absolutely convinced that the font of all magic was bunnies. The party befriended him by killing him and bringing him back, a direct appeal to his instinct of might making right. They freed him from the goblins by telling him that they had, which he believed, and giving him a last name to prove it, which the goblins would never do. His full name became I'i Chuxaroq. He accompanied the party for a bit, then stayed on in the city they helped found, as a guardian. Some time later, the remnants of the party encounter a Jovian in mage armor and robes with bunnies embroidered on it. Apparently, in the gap time, I'i had encountered an anthropomorphic rabbit (Animen) wizard and begged him nearly to death to teach him the secrets of his bunny magic. So, at long last, the poor slave I'i had become his own version of success, now I'i Chuxaroq, Grand High Bunny Mage and Second Protector of the Independent City-State of Samsara. He still threw rocks, but they were usually spelled with fireball or some such before they left his hand. The damage was insane.
I played a vampire pixie nicknamed by the party the Mosquito
Raeven Durocher-Batley Haha, why do I want him to be dressed like a luchalibrador? El Mosquito! -Nerdarchist Ryan
Nerdarchy lol.
Reminds me of the game Fairy Meat.
The Poultrymancer: hard to play at low levels but about lvl 12-15 it becomes extra broke. A Necromancer focused on creating an infinite army of exploding undead chickens.
Back in D&D 3.5, I played a medically insane Sorcerer. Poor guy had been on board a ship, minding his own business, when the ship sank. He managed to get away with his flying carpet, his magical staff, a frying pan, and an Endless Decanter of Dwarven Ale. With a bit of string and a bent nail, he managed to use his staff as a fishing rod, and in the haze of a bit too much dwarven ale, he remembered to steer by the sun to get back to land. Unfortunately, he stayed too drunk to remember that the sun moves during the day...
Three months later, with an impressive sunstroke and a severe case of alcoholism, the party picked him up in their own ship and recruited him.
A bit later in Waterdeep, he traded in his magic staff for enchanting his frying pan; at that point, he was just more attached to the frying pan... it turned out to be Flying and Spell Storing.
The party moved their ship into drydock while he was commissioning his upgrade, though, so when the ship wasn't where he expected to find it, he reasoned quite clearly that it must be where he would not expect to find it, namely near the heights of the city. So for the next week or so, he wobbled around Khelben's tower looking for the ship... until one of the others found him and brought him back on board.
The favourite spell he put in the frying pan, though, was Dimension Hop.
In a naval campaign.
Getting teleported 30 feet in a random direction can be hazardous on people on a ship's deck.
And stating "I'm reloading my frying pan" shouldn't really ever be a logical statement in a battle...
Man, I miss crazy old Careldon... :D
One time I wanted to play a Sorcerer, and this was Pathfinder so you can choose from a LONG list of sorcerous origins.
I chose Plague Sorcerer. Dac'han the dwarven plague sorcerer, who accidentally killed his whole family as a child and had lived in the sewers ever since. He was a disgusting, stinking man-child who constantly got scared and needed hugs.
He died when the paladin in the group finally snapped and back hand smacked him off a cliff xD
RIP Dac'han. 💀 -Nerdarchist Ryan
He got Bac'handed off a cliff?
Two characters-
Paul- a delusional noble warrior who wears an eagle mask. When he was a little boy (he was a bastard half orc to a very accepting family of elves) his older brother- Plinsky would always tease him and call Paul a dirty rat, when Paul told his mother of his numerous wrongdoings. Plinsky considered himself to be a fox, smarter than the admittedly not so bright Paul. When the family died to a group of robbers, Paul lost it when Plinsky somehow made off with all the family's inheritance. Paul sought out and struck Plinsky down, donning an eagle mask to show he had surpassed Plinsky. He roams around crazily, refusing to accept the eagle mask isn't part of his face, and fights for the weak.
Rolls- an extremely acrobatic dwarf with one unique quality. He dual wields shields AND he has a third strapped to his back. This of course, ties in perfectly with his acrobatic skills, and he would always cartwheel inbetween his allies and the enemies to block all kinds of things. He became famous among our group for refusing to walk like a normal person. He would always roll and flip and perform a variety of impressive moves to move mere feet. He has no walking speed, and he refuses to go anything but maximum speed. He also later gained the ability to essentially toss his shields Cap. America style, and Rolls would spin in a circle, and shoot out three bouncing shields, knocking enemies out and seducing women. Fun as hell to play.
I played a warforged bard who very much acted like a robot. I know they're not actually robots, but that's how I played him, and we had fun with it. One time, I accidentally gave the result of a check in the robotic voice I used for the character, and from that point on, we decided he had the capacity to analyze and assign numerical values to his performance on various tasks, which he would then announce.
As a flaw, the DM allowed me to make him three laws compliant, in reference to Isaac Asimov's laws of robotics.
Kyle Ward I
Ah, i see you too are a man of robotic culture
An exile Goliath Wizard (Necromancer), Big Daddy Voodoo, or my old 2nd edition D&D character named Onyx Ironhelm who was a dwarf Cook (fighter) who wore cooking utensils as armor and weapons (a steel washboard as a breast plate, a giant meat cleaver as an axe etc.) just some of my goofy characters.
*"...Big Daddy Voodoo..."*
Callin' all cars, Callin' all cars...
I had a 4th edition swarm druid named Vespidae Karinwald
who rather than being a human who could turn into a swarm she was a colony of
wasps who could turn into a human. She would always refer to herself in the
plural and rather than having a collective consciousness I treated the wasps as
individuals and they had some fun conversations with each other.
My brother was in town for two sessions of my current game and rather than making a character he just played a nonchalant talking goat using the stats from the monster manual. He was rather under powered but the party overcame most of the encounters without violence because of the confusion caused by that goat.
I want to do this now
My craziest? Very hard choice...but I have a few to give as examples:
1) Crackhorn: A triceratops Saurian Wizard that tended to use smaller opponents as clubs and cast mostly utility spells; he never even learned fireball. He would wade into the combat and start smashing/goring/and stomping long before he would cast.
2) Twist: An Elven Sorcerer (before 3rd came along, it was a home brew, but matched the eventual Sorc pretty perfectly) that used Spider Climb, Polymorph, Knock, and various other odd low level spells exclusively. He played as a thief (without any levels in it) and did rather well.
3) Bradley: A world displaced human from Earth that became a Ranger...wielding an enchanted ( fired magic missiles) hunting rifle. The enchantment a gift from the world hopping wizard that accidentally stranded him.
4) Fredrick Bladesilver (aka Fred the Funky Fighter-Mage; aka Archmage Stinky; aka The Purple Mage): A wizard of high family and status struck multiple times with Madness from various sources as he became more powerful and a thorn in their sides. Becoming Fred the Funky Fighter-Mage after the first such incident (and a level of Fighter) he became responsible for some ingenious magic items, such as the Maps of Fred (gps maps, but I first created this in the late eighties); the Rainbow Blades (Prismatic Spray lightsabers) ; Rings of Sound Sleep (put them on and you fall asleep into a time ignoring stasis, pull them off and the wearer awakens perfectly refreshed, whether a century or five seconds passed); and others.
Later being tossed into a Bog of Eternal stench by an angry Demon Lord as he attempted to overthrow him and getting hit *again* with madness, he became Stinky and climbed to god-like levels of power, becoming Archmage Stinky, responsible for a number of world sized pocket dimensions and incredible artifacts (most of which had really random effects or drawbacks). After challenging a dark god he was struck with a curse and alignment swap, becoming the greatly feared (and heavily depowered) Purple Mage, “terrorizing” a number of worlds with his bizarre and sometimes nonsensical “evil plans”.
I played halforc half tiefling with a mental complex. She hated that she was half orc. She had a complex where she wanted to die but it had to be glorious. Basically made a viking.
we had a tiefling sorcerer who was a massive clepto maniac, in the first session he collected so much stuff that he was almost immobile and none of us new because he cast minor illusion on himself.
HellFire044 I laughed for a solid minute, thank you.
Surprised they didn't mention the most legendary and broken D&D character, the man who WON 'Call of Cthulhu' while playing 'Trail of Cthulhu', the man who went a little crazy after Vietnam, despite never having set foot in the country. The guy who talked with his pet stuffed parrot while assuming that the other party members were hallucinations.
Crazy. Old Man. Henderson.
For four years now I've been playing a character aptly named The Cheat. He started off as a rogue, and eventually became a cleric of Olidammara, even becoming a Divine Agent of Olidammara. For years he skimmed off the top of the group loot stash (never let a thief manage your group's loot). When the time came I told my GM I was going to fund the creation of a Cold Iron Golem. He told me the price as a joke, and I gave him the gold.. and the documents to prove I had it and where I'd been stealing from the group for 3 years previous. The whole room went silent.I still play The Cheat. Now he's a plane traveling miscreant who dabbles in evil artifacts that he really shouldn't be getting his hands on. He does the holy work of Olidammara which is usually eat drink and be merry, and occasionally sew chaos. Its a great plot device for getting adventuring groups out to fix the things he messes up.
IkariMadness How did you steal a bit of the group's gold w/o them realizing.
We maintain a group inventory for gold and items instead of splitting it all up right away. So I was made the fool to keep track of all inventory because I type fastest. So every time we split out some money to buy something I held a little back from the "chest" and squirrel some away onto my character sheet.
And having a giant sentient cold iron golem named Sherman helps.
Had a wizard in a group do something similar, but he had a bartering ability that made us sell things for a slight markup, he kept the markup. Ended up funding his spell book, he owned every spell up to 5th level. His "spellbook"was an indexed bookcase in a portable hole.
How do you pick locks with boxing gloves on?
Oh gosh, Dave's story just made me remember Dumbleduck, my crazed gnome necromancer in a One Shot game. had 4 zombies, Frank, Frenk, Fronk, and Frunk, and was on a quest for the perfect Frink. Had a fish in a fishbowl, and had a compulsion to show literally every animate creature his fish. his last words while being disintegrated by a beholder were
"Have you seen my fish?"
"...yes, I have seen your fish."
"yaaaaaay...."
Dumbleduck died happy XD
Maromania that's amazing
The funniest character I've had the pleasure of adventuring with was a druid named Sour P who, true to his name, peed on everything, but he was so charismatic he got away with it.
My craziest character is a dwarf bard who used to be a soldier but chickened out, ran away and joined the circus. He is not a typical musically inclined bard, though. He activates his bard powers by telling bad jokes and puns.
Dave, thanks for the Gutwrench shout out. RIP, old buddy.
My oddest character was a 2E Shadowrun character: "Killjester"
Killjester was a Street Samurai but didn't fight like regular cyborgs. He fought like he was living in a cartoon. He carried a large "trick bag" filled with small exploding wind-up robots and dinosaur toys, a yoyo rigged as a grenade, chem-sprayers rigged with DMSO and tattoo dye (perfect for permanently staining opponents' faces and blinding them), and the like.
Yes, he had guns and such, but that was for when things got too serious.
He once used a caulking gun to line a wall with liquified explosive in the shape of Bugs Bunny crashing through a wall, and when that went off, he had a tennis ball launcher loaded with super-bouncy balls shoot through the hole as a distraction.
THEN he came in through an upper window with smoke grenades (loaded with spray glue and sparkles) and SMGs.
Any foes he defeated were left at the scene with foam clown noses super-glued on. If KJ fell in combat, he had a "deadman switch" hooked up to a plastic daisy that would pop out of his chest armor.
If the other players wanted to play Shadowrun, there would be "are you playing Killjester tonight?" concerns.
The "Killjester" concept was so inspiring that I always found a way to make the concept for other systems, including the World of Darkness LARP. "Dementation" in gameplay from a guy in mime facepaint and a camo vest and spiked wristbands....that set the tone.
My friend Paul had a great Shadowrun character nicknamed "Packrat" who was a Raccoon shaman. He wanted to embrace the animal side of the totem, and rummaged through garbage, always dipped his food in water or coffee, and was constantly in trouble. Imaging a guy who barely cracks 5' tall, and who can't drive, but insists on doing so in a powerful muscle car. The accelerator was worn smooth, the brake pedal was bent, and the clutch had a spider living under it from disuse. It's a good thing that car was armored... That campaign was pretty zany. Where other shamans would summon spirits or throw fireballs, he'd use Control Actions to make a foe sing "I'm a Little Teapot", dance and all.
killjester sounded like one fun guy to have at parties.
Matt Shack That's not what the players thought. ;)
My weirdest character was a Rogue named Freya Something. She was human but raised by gnomes after her parents were killed. Her gnome family were merchants and alchemists so she was always trying to make business contacts and sell questionable gnomish goods. The thing is that her Wisdom was low and she didn't really understand people or indeed anything she didn't learn in a book. When she found a ragged blanket in an evil stronghold she thought it was a mythical wraith cloak and began wearing it as a cape. Someone in the party mockingly called it Wraith Cloak, Devourer of Souls and the name stuck. Freya had the last laugh when the cloak later gained intelligence and an ego.
BitsyTheNinja of
In my regular D&D group, I'm regularly known as the person who comes up with odd or crazy character concepts. Probably the two craziest that I have would be my two jester characters (both made for 5e) . One was Zenith, a chimeric high elf (meaning things like his hair and eyes were colored differently) who was born and raised in a large family that ran a traveling circus. He was a dancer (specifically a belly dancer) who ended up becoming a masked jester and a fighter. He wielded two bladed tambourines, kicked ass, delivered puns ( "-guy is burnt to ash from a dragon's fire breath- Guess that guy made an ash-hole of himself eh?" -cue party groaning- ) and all that good stuff. In the campaign, he eventually became a vampire after screw-ups were made (though the vampirism was significantly tweaked so my character was balanced with the rest of the party). Sadly, that campaign crumbled due to scheduling conflicts and the DM lost his notes and everything when his computer fried so that was that for Zenith.
The other jester character is Gesture. He's a monk, way of the shadow, effectively works like a Dark Brotherhood assassin. He uses the guise of a fool to get into the courts of nobility, uses the position to obtain information and secrets, assassinates people and all that jazz. The funny thing about him was that he was effectively a mime in a jester costume. His attire was black, white and red, he was mute and had to communicate via charades or notes (until he could take a dip into Warlock, pact of the Great Old One and could use telepathy). He only got to be in a campaign for two sessions before that game fell apart (different group, same scheduling issues). But it was hilarious to see the group go 'oh great it's a mime' and then he proceeds to nat 20 a stealth check to scout ahead in a cave and kill off four guys before he sets off the alarms. There was a new fear of mimes instilled in that group that day.
Aidan, The Half-Elf Bard, ladies man, keeper of hearts, woe of fathers, joy to mothers, keeper of lore, sexiest man alive(self proclaimed). this guy...managed to essentially pull off the Harem no Jutsu from Naruto... and seduced the BBEG. He would flirt with the enemy in combat, and would do everything he could to Shame enemies to death. Vicious Mockery or go home.
I once played a Grizzly Bear Paladin that had gone Deadpool level of insanity because when his goddess (Melora) gave him setience she inadvertently exposed him to raw asteral power of the universe itself frying his brain like a couple of eggs. As a result very loyal to his party, very prone to drinking, breaking the forth wall, making healing potions from holy water infused wine, he often ate his enemies (It's not cannabilsm if there not the same species) and he invented both morphine and dynamite. He later died kamakzing a dragon to save the party
that sounds like it was fun too bad I've never had a DM that would let me do that . You must have a kool Dm.
Actually He was the single worst DM I ever had. He was incredibly manipulative, verbally abusive, controlling to the point of basically giving us scripts that if we didn't fallow what he wanted us to he would basically throw temper tantrums. The reason my I killed my character was to leave his campaign. A week later two more players took there characters out of his game, and we started playing a different campaign.
One character I enjoyed a lot was a super character known as "The Glitch", who was always putting a glitch in the villain's schemes. The background was a DnD2e Lich that a Paladin put a Belt of Reversing Alignment on and punted into a portal. The Glitch had to use a permanent illusion to keep folks from seeing its skeletal self and knew that removing the belt would be an evil act and thus to be avoided.
I once made a wizard. Except it was actually a rogue con-man pretending to be a wizard to fraud the team of adventurers. I made full use of the "whisper" function with the DM, since we were on roll20.
I then promptly sold the quest item, and derailed the quest by telling the other players the merchant was a thief, and that the quest giver was a psycho.
I lasted all of 3 hours before the DM realized he couldn't handle this and just told me the thieve's guild had assassinated my character, and to make another character.
Twas the best 3 hours I played in any game.
I admire you, sir
I made a character for GURPS once who was a stage magician who had Cowardice as a disadvantage and womanizer as a quirk. Cowardice was basically worth a good amount of disadvantage points because my character had to do everything in his power not to get into physical danger. But he was a stage magician, no spells or anything, he did stuff like pull a coin from behind your ear, or card tricks. So the other guys were like combatants or whatever, and it turned out to actually be a huge advantage because he would do things like interpose the other players between him and danger, and use tricks to disappear from sight and run away. So these stacked, dangerous fights would break out, he would get to safety and find ways to steal stuff or get NPC's killed fighting the "monster" or whatever. And then he would use his charisma to smooth things over
I played an Eldritch Knight (with one level in Barbarian) that looked like Gandalf and his real job was guard the real wizard.
Splutnik the Sewer Rat, a goblin artificer who made his artificer creations out of shit. He wore old cookware as armor, used a shovel as a dagger and had a burlap bag of crap that he carried around with him so he could fashion his creations.
Oh, I thought you meant literally doodoo
Actually yes. That's what the bag is for. It's full of crap.
Cool idea. I had my friends play a short goblin campaign and their first task was to take a cart from a shed on a farm. My alchemist goblin packed his pouch full of poo and climbed the house. The others accidently made noise because of the horse. So the farmer released his dog. Shortly after the farmer came out to be hit by a flaming alchemical poo bomb. :)
The weirdest character I have played in my rather limited experience playing was a Rock Gnome Druid who was a little less than sane. At the start of combat, he would throw one of his small tinker toys at the enemy and then when he watched them break and fall on the ground in front of them he would accuse them of killing it. Which spiralled into a Wild Shape and him eating their face. Only to rebuild them and repeat the cycle all over again. Was comical roleplaying his freak outs.
Sounds like you guys had some awesome crazy characters wandering through your campaigns :). Personally, when it comes to crazy characters, three come to mind:
1) Thermidor the Magnificent, Scourge of Vermin. Also known as 'sprinkles' to those he was disinclined to employ evocation spells against, Thermidor was a cat who'd been a wizard's pet at one point and had, through the old wizard's experimentation with spells, effectively been hit by a supercharged version of the Awaken spell. Being a cat, he immediately decided with his now 18 (at lvl. 1!) Int score that he was too good to stick around as a pet and was going to rule the world for himself. He didn't get very far, but there were good moments all the same, especially since being a cat makes it extraordinarily easy to blend into an urban environment.
2) The Electric Lemur Imperium. Haven't gotten to play this one yet, but basically the Imperium is a group of five clockwork lemurs equipped with musical instruments who together are one bard, sharing spell slots and such the way hags in a coven would. Having escaped from an alchemical laboratory, each lemur would have a different 'caricatured' personality, with a different one in charge of the group's actions on each day.
3) Bartleby. A truly infernal creation, Bartleby was a doddering, 400-year-old, hopelessly senile forest Gnome warlock of Cthulhu, with an alignment that quite literally read “chaotic amnesiac” and a magical item known as a “Beard of Holding,” filled with an inventory that was random-rolled completely from the 5e PHB item tables. Basically, he was once a great and powerful warlock who was bent on world domination, but his plans were foiled, his association with the Great Old One drove him insane, then senile, and he now spent his days wandering about town mumbling to himself, sitting in a rocking chair on the porch of his hobbit house, and lovingly tending to his garden. Gentle, gullible, and prone to completely misidentifying any and every situation he came across, Bartleby would seem pretty harmless at first. He wasn't. In the first three sessions in the campaign that I played him in, his main quest was to get milk, since he'd run out at home. Of course, the town was under siege by the cult of the dragon queen, but hey, he needed the milk. In the process of getting it, he killed several looting cultists who he believed merely to be insolent youths, blew up an alchemists' shop with the result that around twenty kobolds in the vicinity got high as a kite off of the fumes and perceived him as their new glorious leader, and then led said kobolds in burning down about 60% of the town in the chaos until they eventually found a general store. Those kobolds were later all equipped with musical instruments and became the party's (rather incompetent) pep band as the adventure went on, while another member of the party (some kind of small sea-elf) eventually took up permanent residence in Bartleby's beard.
I laughed my ass off reading Bartleby's story. You sir, deserve an Oscar!
TheFrenchTaunter
Same, dude! I almost cried!
LONG LIVE BARTLEBY!!! AND THE BEARD OF HOLDING!!!!
I played a wizard who was insane with a taxadermy fox as his magical implement
2nd edition. The DM mentioned a previous campaign with a different group that featured a Jester type Bard whose weapon was a rubber chicken with a vorpal beak
My craziest character is a Half-Orc Arcane Trickster Rogue named Grog The Unseeable. He was originally based off of some silly tumblr meme about a guy who played a rogue that instead of stealthing would just intimidate his foes. (It went something like: "YOU NO SEE GROG!!!" "I can't see you! I can't see you!"). This of course is a pretty lame character concept in practice, especially in a group like mine that roleplays quite a bit. So I gave him a backstory, became an Arcane Trickster to augment his sneaking abilities with magic. Then once we started playing, I basically became the comic relief character. I had entered the campaign late, my friends started in on a road trip I couldn't join in on. So I decided to just act like a silly side character. I helped them on their quest in ridiculous ways like blowing stuff up with barrels of homemade alcohol, gave him a thick Russian accent in broken commmon and third person since I couldn't really pull off a normal gruff orc sounding one, and in general just acted like that crazy friend. It gets better though. Our DM is a little sassy and would sometimes make comments at Grog's expense, so at one point he said something at Grog and I acted out hearing some disembodied voice with Grog refers to as "Sky Voice". Its just become part of the game and mow we've got this plan to homebrew a Warlock of the DM if Grog dies so Sky Voice will bring him back as a servant. He's my favorite to play.
A character I have yet to be able to play is a Bard who is literally a mime. Dip a bit into The Old One Warlock for telepathy, and use a lot of minor illusions to give his performances sound, instead of having an instrument for his bardic inspiration he just mimics banging a marching band drum and adds the sound through illusions.
Also a bard who's bardic instrument is a one man band
Also, one character that is psionically linked twins.
Too many fun ideas, not enough time
I've only made one unusual character. He was a bard who thought he was a wizard. He eventually went to this meeting of wizards that another character was going to, at the meeting my character convinced some of the most powerful wizards and convinced them that he created a new form of arcane magic based off music theory. By the end of that campaign my bard had spread word of his deeds far across the lands and was thought of as the most powerful wizard of the century by the common man. Our group was split between the actual wizard and our paladin (planned split) my character went with the paladin and the fate of the realm was decided between a magic duel between the two most powerful wizards, mine and the other player. Our DM stopped the campaign when our characters finished discussing the terms and conditions of the dule, for example a condition was who ever won would be the new commander of our keep. We never played out the duel and my friends and I keep questioning who won the duel.
DAM it this is where you have an assassin disappear the wizard
Clever DM, picking that point to end the campaign. Leaves you both with the mystery of who wins, rather than the angst and pride of a clear result.
rashkavar nah that kinda sucks thats a Permanente cliffhanger
My craziest character was a warlock that was actually crazy due to PTSD from his background as a solider. Trapped behind enemy lines of orc war bands his squad was killed and only him and his best friend survived for days hiding in a pit of dead soldiers when his friend was caught trying to steal food. He was tourched and killed. Then beheaded with his head tossed by him. He then started hearing the skull speak to him. It was the Old Ones guiding him to safety.
The skull became his focus and he spoke to it often. He spent most of his time trying to convince the party to not kill major villains like necromancers because he convinced them to surrender if they served his needs. He was truly LE.
However he was reluctant to do the evil acts, he did them out of a feeling of obligation because his patron saved his life.
Here's a crazy character concept for 5E: the 14,000-15,000 year old Druid. The build is this: start with an Wood Elf, and have it become a Half-Dragon. Then, get it up to level 18. Elves live 700-750 years, being a half-dragon doubles that, to 1,400-1,500 years. Then, add the level 18 druid ability, Timeless body, which slows the aging rate to 1/10 the normal rate, meaning this character now lives 14,000-15,000 years!
I had a halfling that got addicted to hallucinogens (Black Lotus Poppies or some such)... and he began to worship a chaotic neutral god of madness. He was a multi-class Ranger 2 Cleric 4 Thief 8 who was basically out of his gourd most of the time. Against a dragon (youg adult) with the rest of his party... his weapons were basically crap, so he used his boots of striding and springing to do a flying headbutt on the dragon and he rolled a natural crit. The DM ruled that the dragon only took 2 points of damage since my character wasn't wearing headgear, but she also fell to the floor laughing after my character was laid out unconscious with a severe knot on his noggin. The rest of the group didn't know what to make of the situation until the dragon told them to sheath their weapons. The dragon had said it was the funniest thing she'd ever seen and agreed to let us go after they explained why they'd attacked her. I think she became my character's lover... but was never really sure though... he was kinda prone to "fits of creative whimsy" and the hallucinogens practically guaranteed that he never quite figure it out. Or why his invisible horse never ate. Or why his bag of holding kept throwing up. Or...well um...yeah...
Cheers.
I love these types of characters, combat can be broken so easily that I just prefer using stat checks & coming up crazy as characters.
My craziest character that I want to play is Ser Toppenbottom, he is a bard and is actually two gnomes sitting on one anothers shoulders with crazy high deception that they use to convince everyone they are one singular entity. No DM I have had yet has let me play Ser Toppenbottom... It makes me very sad.
One character I want to play at some day is a drow celestial pact warlock. He thought he was making a fiend pact, and went through the contract with a fine toothed comb looking for fine print that would screw him, but forgot to check whether the angel he was dealing with was actually fallen. Now he’s bound to a patron that is trying to reform him against his wishes.
Shump Ironrod, Halfling Barbarian. Was abducted by Orcs who mistook him for a human child, planned to fatten him up and eat him. He didn't get any larger though, so they made him their slave, and then mascot. He was eventually "rescued" when the Orc tribe was slain, but became an adventure because he honestly believed that he was an Orc, and thus didn't reintegrate back into society very well. He wore warpaint, rode a boar, and acted like a stereotypical Barbarian, albeit pint-sized and possessed of a massive napoleon-complex.
The mention of the gnome with the fishbowl reminds me of something my brother once mentioned happened in a game - the Fishbowl of Holding in which the party carried Flipper, the dolphin.
I once played in a d20 Modern campaign based in the Mortal Kombat universe. I played a wereboar named BOARden Ramsay. He was a greasy biker type (he rode a HOG) who dressed kind of like Fonzie, had a bizarre hybrid Southern-New York accent, and carried his signature triple-barrel shotgun that had a giant "switchblade" mechanic in the stock so it could double as a kind of glaive when out of ammo.
My oddest character back in Pathfinder was a Monk all about movement. He moved faster than almost anything in the campaign, lol. He ran off with the big bad's McGuffin device at the end like the Flash. 😄
I LOVE to make characters that are "different", I have been playing a demon lord in a campaign for the past few weeks....or rather an avatar of a demon lord. I also really like the tick thing you guys were talking about, that sounds pretty cool.
played a gnome illusionist whose only damaging spell was magic missile. got dropped into a sort of 1v1 battle tournament thing which, for someone with not a lot of damage potential, was quite the problem. ended up fighting a paladin, really goody two shoes kind of guy. what do i do? i make everything he's wearing invisible and just kept showing him random scenes of him having sex with whatever till he conceded out of embarrasment
i did not create this character concept, but i figured that i would throw it on here anyway, its a pathfinder build. (Drunken brute 1 / Ninja ??) starting as a drunken brute give the drunken rage theme for the character, and as he lvs he begins to unlock his latent Ki, sometimes becoming so drunk that he uses shadow clones, but just thinks he is seeing double. Also other ki powers would be under the context of the alcohol giving him liquid confidence.
I played a Bard Kenku (bird person), but Kenku weren't a 'usual' race in the DMs world, so her backstory was that she was actually a human who was cursed into being a crow, and then the attempt to turn her back to normal screwed up. She had a Jug of Alchemy, which can produce various substances once a day (a couple gallons of water, a couple ounces of honey, etc). We were fighting a powerful wizard who was using Improved Invisibility; my bard threw 40 gallons of mayo in her general direction. It was amazing.
my favorite part of DMing is creating tons of unique NPCs for the party to encounter. My favorite so far is an older rock gnome inventor named Fnipper Ningle Alston Doxenborough III. He talks fast, is extremely friendly, has no concept of personal space, and while brilliant, is a little off his rocker. I paired him with his blacksmith partner, an intimidating dwarf who's missing an arm and only speaks in grunts. The dichotomy made for some very entertaining moments.
I was playing a Pathfinder game where firearms were in the world, and I was playing a gnome gunslinger who was completely crazy except for when he had a gun in his hand which made for some great role-playing.
Not mine, but a friend once made some joke classes for 3.5 DnD: the martial Ridiculist and its spellcasting counterpart, the Prepostomancer. He eventually ran a game set in the planes, and someone was actually allowed to roll a Ridiculist. It was quite an experience. They mostly had a bunch of crazy abilities that allowed them to use stats in ways they weren't supposed to be used (for instance, he could use STR instead of INT for intelligence checks, but only if he shouted "MY MUSCLES TELL ME" in character before revealing whatever knowledge he gained), though they also had "very exotic weapon proficiency," which allowed them to gain proficiency in something that wasn't supposed to be a weapon (and I think granted some bonuses to wielding it). He rolled dice with pictures on them gathered from various board games to determine his starting equipment, which was mostly a bunch of random weapons and ammunition, some firewood, etc., but it also included a dwarven pirate and an elven ninja. He chose to be proficient in *people,* and dual wielded the pirate and ninja (the ninja was keen!). His "weapons" started out alive, but we never healed them so they died within a few combats. He kept wielding them, and would also occasionally grapple enemies and wield them as weapons. Strangely enough, it fit in pretty well since the planes were already pretty wacky.
I once had a Sprite warlock, pact of the chain that had a familiar that was another Sprite.
I never made it clear but I often eluded to it either being me, a family member, or my spouse. It was kinda messed up but a lot of fun
*Who needs a book when you can write the spells on your skin? - Melbar the Mad*
I once played an elf in a custom campaign named Yzarc. He had a split personality disorder. The second personality always came into play when combat started and remained there until he drank water. The second personality, which was only called "Crazy" by the players, loved violence and chaos. So he often stole things while Crazy and returned them as Yzarc. In the end of the campaign, Yzarc turned out to be the weaker personality (hint: read "Yzarc" backwards) that was being controlled by Crazy, who turned out to be the demon general of Chaos who, ultimately, was the boss right before the final campaign boss.
It was pretty epic and I got to play my first crazy character. Since then I only play crazy ones, who still go into combat, but make idiotic decisions whenever they can ^^
Got a player in one of my games who made Natsu Dragneel in 5e. Zariel Tiefling Dragonblood Sorcerer. All fire spells, with Flames of Phlegeos, Tavern Brawler, and Elemental Adept - Fire feats. He's absolutely awesome.
had a player play an oakling fire druid, where his body was chard from fire, hated humans, and had never ending oneliners but he always was just saying them like the oakling didn't understand his quick comments were comical. Was farming these mushrooms that would grow on one side of him. his catch phrase was a deep chuckle, " oak, oak, oak, oak"
My favorite character was a wild magic sorcerer with multiple personalities that I co-played with a friend. We switched who controlled the character every time one of us rolled a one or a twenty. We also stipulated that the conversation between the players also occurred in character. I remember one conversation in combat where we argued about whether or not to use fireball. Our turns had a time limit so needless to say we spent the entire combat encounter arguing with ourself.
When I was played D&D 5th for the first time, my character, while not what I'd call "crazy" but he was certainly a little...unorthodox. I named him Sanders and I decided to play as a Rouge since they were easy to play as and offered more versatility to the than a fighter. I the chose the Assassin subclass and specialised in dual weilding and equiped him with throwing knives and fire grenades and had him be skilled in stealth and acrobatics. As for the race...I picked Dargonborn. So the sum up, my charachter was basically 6ft tall, scaly, deal weilding, knife trowing, baddass dressed in black with the agility of a ninja and a built-in flamethrower to boot.
I think one of my favorite characters was Vain, a 3rd edition Rog/Clr anti-hero. He was a LE character in an otherwise all good aligned group, and the only character capable of detecting alignments. I had the other players convinced Vain was cursed, because all his summons were devils.
We went through the tomb of horrors with throw away characters that we rolled 3d6 for each stat straight down. First roll is strength, second is dex, etc. Mine was a bard that I optimized for a spy game rather than an intense dungeon crawl. He lasted about half the tomb, and everyone else lost about 4 characters each at about that time.
Timber Nine claws. My favorite was and is a low 8 intelligence Alchemist Tabaxi. Always second guessing himself and always checking his notes. I frequently used the tabaxi table to see what he was interested in at the time, because like all cats his interest is ever changing. "Open the door please, nah i dont wanna go in." I used the dawnforgedcast alchemist multiclassed with monk. He was a student at a monestary but he always got bullied because he was so small and weak, so after years of research, which is slow because of low intelligence, he finally summised a potion to make himself taller and stronger. Any time somebody would mention size he would always make sure that people understood that he was "tall" and "strong" with 8 strength :D My way of explaining his capabilities as an alchemist was that he was bad at inventing stuff, but good at following notes and recipes, so his way of inventing new recipes was to mix random ingredients and note them down, incase he needed to recreate it later, and then drink it. Which regularly would resolve in him turning in to a monster, metamorph from the class, going from Doctor Jekyll into mister Hide.
He was also a character I made to test a multiclass build, trying to make as fast a character as possible. So far he has managed to have a speed of 720Ft in one round running or 1000Ft in a round, depending on how you calculate it. 30 + 10(monk)+10(longstrider)+10(mobile feat), movement, action dash, step of the wind dash, extra dash action (haste potion) quadruple/triple speed (haste + Feline agility).
I've always wanted to create a fully rng character. Rolled stats, rolled race, rolled class, rolled background, etc. See what the dice comes up with. 😄
I just made a tiefling artificer (dipping into warlock and wizard for extra firepower, literally) that sings a modified version of "Hellfire" from the Hunchback of Notre Dame whenever he goes into combat, and starts casually blasting fire and bullets. Aptly calling himself Hellfire, because of course.
"HellFIRE! *bang*
Dark FIRE! *Fwoosh*" Hehehe.
I never got the chance to play him, but I also at one point made a dragonborn fighter that was raised by halflings.
Lord Pookie-Wookums, Bringer of Pies and Death. Orc Bard-Barian, who's fighting style was throwing his pies at people. He was also a Noble of Waterdeep, a famous singer, and novelist.
One of my players is a human pact of the blade warlock who is obsessed with cleaning and uses his awesome powers to summon a mop that he uses for murder and tidying up. He also made his pact with a unicorn, and has a unicorn tramp stamp.
I like odd combos like a Teifling Redemption Paladin who struggles with his nature. A half orc tribal bard drummer. A human fighter who has a few barbarian levels just to mechanically reflect his personal anguish and frustration rather than barbarian traditions. He's just become a tavern brawler essentially. 👍
Making these work RP wise is more fun than min/maxing for me.
Kyrus Fel'Tongue, a Tiefling Monk who used magic hairbands in his hair (which took the form of bandages) to be able to make his hair whip his enemies. This with Monk made for very crazy and wacky combinations of attack, seeing Flurry of Blows and using a second strike as a bonus action.
I had an Eladrin Wildmage Spellsword, who was totally mentally unhinged, played by my brother.
Even his backstory was that he was found walking naked through a city, blowing marshmallow bubbles (basically summoning food) with each breath.
Because we had so few players, the DMPC was in the party, and was in charge of keeping the Wildmage under control.
Had a catfolk rogue in pathfinder that had a ball of yarn named frank, frank used to get tossed at enemies in battle to help out. the rogue also liked to steal candy from fat people, since they didnt "need" it. Also had an elf ranger with amnesia, had dwarfs as favored enemy, and hated them without knowing why. He also colected socks from fallen enemies.
Probably my favorite was in Pathfinder as a half-elven lost girl summoner turned cannibal while raised by a displacer beast. As she grew into her power, she summoned forth an Eidolon that resembled a displacer beast named Dio. She was more like a wild beast than a trained mage, and had no concept of civilization or law. Also, only spoke Elven and Sylvan. So it was fun to play :) Gotta give props to the GM for dealing with that situation.
I ended up driving our trigger happy fireballer mage into madness where he developed an intense fear of tentacles. My first encounter with the party was while they had set up an ambush, all hiding in different bushes. My character noticed the mage, as he had horrible stealth. Dio grabbed him with the tentacles and blinked away with him. Then he point blank fireballed Dio and I.
He narrowly escaped, as did I. Eventually I helped them ambush the thing they were waiting for, and joined them. I learned Common from the group, and referred to the fire mage as "Food" for the duration of his life. Until he went mad and turned on the party. Eventually, she did eat him in the end. Well cooked by his own fire.
I'm having fun with a NPC Alehouse Drake, from the Tome of Beasts, who's alcholism fuels his powers and smart ass attitude.
Also, while not the character himself, my Warlock of Hastur accidentally created a cult of well groomed Gnolls who are now roaming the underdark like door to door evangelists.
If I ever start DMing I'm going to have a female dwarf bar owner that's like the Scotsman's wife from Samurai Jack , sound a lot like Alehouse Drake.
I rolled up Alok Maarg, Troll Slayer. Only one complication. He had an innate and severe fear of fire, so his preferred weapon of choice was something bladed. Of course when he made his living slaying Trolls, and was unable to use fire at all, that made for interesting role playing.
My favorite 3.5 character was a half Dwarf, half Ogre. He was large and had a 10ft reach, but since he was part dwarf, we decided he was ‘only’ around 6 1/2 ft tall. So he was basically built like a gorilla with super long arms that came to his knees. He was a grappler who just pummeled people with brass knuckles and threw his pet rock (a 150lb Boulder) at people.
Favorite 5e character: Great Old One warlock who made a pact with Cthulhu, but she’s a crazy cat lady, so to her it’s Cathulhu, and she believes she will eventually be turned into a cat. She talks to these otherworldly voices that speak to her, as well as full on conversations with animals, (thank you speak with animals at will) as well as clapping and giggling when bad people are set on fire, eviscerated, etc, so even though she is only about 4’8” everyone is terrified of her. It also helps that she has a +9 to intimate. 😆
I played a kobald sorcerer who had tied scorpions to the end of his staff and lashed it about. He didn't talk aside from some grunts and barks and when he started to get stressed he would (try to) eat whatever small objects we're in arms reach.
Goblin alchemist "patches", covered head to toe in a dirty ratty robe. mount is war pig named bacon. Infinite bacon ration via regen. Eventually built a goblin mushroom brewery conglomerate via hireling hijinks and leadership skills. Used goblin hirelings to spring traps. Disquise used to make people think he was a dirty smelly halfling. Lots of pockets potions and utility. Big thing was his trusty boomstick. Ran this in pathfinder.
a friend in AD&D played a half-orc fright/rogue with low int called "IHAK" (I Have A Knife) this way of robing someone was talk up to them and draw a 2 handed sword and put it to the person's neck.
My friend Gavin made a mute gnomish barbarian with monkey grip and a greatsword in 3.5. He had something like +5 to intimidation at first level.
Not watched the video yet, just the title.
Crazy character idea. Tortle monk. BAM! *Minds Blown* lmao!
My greatest was a goblin alchemist with 3 distinct personalities. Gave each of them social, exploration, and combat triggers that would give them DM a mechanic to make my character flip to another personality; for example, one was arachnophobic, another hated heights, etc. Pathfinder/3.5. DM allowed me different builds for each one. First, NG, grenadier, timid but always on edge. Second, CN, vivesectionist, was much cockier and standoffish. And then the 3rd was built on the NPC warrior class, but he believed he was a paladin. Believed his torch was his divine mace. Played the 'paladin' as far over-the-top as i could.
Oh boy, my craziest player character i've seen as a dm is Marshall Law, the tiefling elemental lighting sorceror. He was basically a sorceror cowboy with a revolver made of enchanted glass. He got his powers from a lightning dragon that killed his family and took his legs. He wore prosthetics and eventually got magical metal ones that could summon an iron golem im the form of a warhorse. He was also basically from fantasy Australia
DM 5e Question: I have a player looking to take the Retainer feature as part of a custom background. She understands they are non-combatants that won't follow her into dangerous situations, but wants to know what skills if any that can have. She is looking to reimagine them as her family, a husband and two teenage kids, that she travels with and provides for. I think it is cool, but I don't know how skilled they can be before they become a major advantage for her character and unbalance the game for my other players.
Hmm, by virtue of giving them any skills, they become unbalanced. They're basically NPCs that the player can narratively interact with for RP and extra sets of hands for carrying things. Anything beyond that makes the feature too good. That being said, I've used the Retainer feature with two PCs and really enjoyed myself under the described parameters. -Nerdarchist Ryan
This is an awesome Idea, you have a great player there! To answer your questions, The "retainers" are said to be commoners in the text of the Background feature. This isn't meant as flavor, those are the actual game mechanics.
Commoners(MM p.345) basically have 10 in each stat, no skill proficiencies and are CR0, so you don't need to worry about game balance. The reason these retainers don't follow into dangerous situations is because they are so weak, having only 4HP...
Now, if this seems underwhelming for you and/or your player, you can reward her creativity by giving these retainers a slight bump over the standard commoners. You could give each of them a single skill in which they are proficient and give them a proficiency bonus half that of the PC character they are tied to. This way, they aren't secondary characters, they don't outshine any PC, but they have a bit more interest to them other than the RP.
If that's not enough, I guess you can also add one or both of the following Ideas:
1- The retainers gain 1HP per Level of the PC they are tied to.
2- Instead of all 10s for stats, the retainers use an array weaker than the standard array for PC characters. I'd go for: 14, 13, 12, 10, 8, 7
While these modifications might make her retainers more powerful than the standard commoner, I don't believe any or even all of them make enough of a difference to worry about game balance. They have no weapon proficiencies, incredibly low HP and only OK stats. What they do however is reward your player for her creativity and allow her to customize her "family"!
Hope this helps!
Thanks, it certainly helps.
The weirdest build I've had was sprung from neccesity, rather than on purpose. I played Gwenneth Graymirin the rock Gnome bard, who had invented the saxophone and was looking for adventure out of spite, and wasn't really built for the stress of saving the world, but she managed gracefully. The issue was that because of how the team was set up, she ended up having to carry it on multiple different fronts. She acted as the team healer, wizard, rougue, and even sometimes had to use her unusually good strength to get past obsticals the fighters couldnt. All without ever multiclassing. Just a combination of bardic magics and her size and items. She was so busy having to do the work of 4 other classes, she hardly had time to bard at all. It became a running joke, me being the rougueclericwizbard.
I quickly made a monk/fighter build. He focused on the air elemental attacks with way of the elements and was a battlemaster
let's see... I ran a 3.5 monster game that had a mind flayer, a pit fiend, a war troll, and a pixie were-shark ;)
I had a strange character idea
Name: Billy bongos
Class: bard (obviously)
Race: human
He believes he is the God of bongos and can give boons to people the thing is those boons are completely useless
Boon of companionship: you can summon bongos at times of need
Boon of strongos: you gain advantage on all strength checks that involve bongos such as lifting really heavy bongos or hitting bongos really hard
Boon of ultimate bongo power: you now have the ability to turn into a bongo with arms and legs
My craziest Combo was with a Halfling Bard and a Goliath Sorcerer. We came across a hydra in the story before, and so the halfling was able to polymorth into it. Me, as the goliath, picked him up, threw him above our enemies, where he turned into a hydra and I cast enlarge on him.... Oh the fun times of a huge 3x3 squares hydra with 5 heads falling onto our enemies.
I've played a Dwarf Transmutation wizard in Pathfinder who was covered in magic tattoos, shaved his head, and chose to smash things in the face with his axe after buffing himself up with magic. He refused to use any "normal" spells for damage like fireball. Instead he would cast Ghost Sound specifically to have a chorus of screams follow him into battle to unnerve his opponents, or stuff like hydraulic push, but colored blood red. He used the blood of his enemies to create the magic inks for his tattoos. His spellbook was made from the skins of his strongest enemies. When that campaign finished, someone asked me what his alignment was because they were curious, and I told them from day one he was just Chaotic Awesome, I hadn't really considered an alignment other than chaotic-something.
My favorite is my Dwarf hobo who was a thief/fighter that I've recreated in several editions. He's based off the dwarf from the D&D movie with Marlon Wayans in it, and a lot of Danny Devito as Frank Reynolds. He's a crude, gross, slob of a Dwarf who was cast out of his homeland for being crude, gross, and a slob. He's a cowardly scavenger who will do anything to survive. Even when he became rich from his schemes, he chose to live like a hobo. He would almost never be attacked by enemies because he looked like someone's slave, so he would take advantage and stab them in the back with some dirty knife that was covered in filth and disease. His main goals were getting laid, getting drunk, getting even, and eating as much as he could.
"Getting laid, getting drunk and getting even!" Sounds like a cool Dwarven Motto! XD
That was actually the start of the concept for him. I'll have to have him start saying that though
I wanted to do a half drow sword sage who fought with a kama and a silk rope. His whole thing would be to incapacitate enemies while others killed them or to use it to choke out enemies with a noose.
I haven't played often enough to have anything actually played out. But I do have the idea of if I were to DM having a mimic merchant somewhere in my world
one character I enjoyed was a gospel singer, a cleric/bard multiclass
I really want to make a Dragonborn Druid that is like the movie Big, but turned up to 11. He was actually born a halfling, but when he was ten, he fell out of a tree and died. A friend of the family cast reincarnate on him, growing him a new, adult body. So instead of being a 2'5" halfling child, he's now a 6'4" adult Dragonborn. I'd even make his arcane focus a halfling slingstaff to evoke the "kid with a slingshot" imagery.
He'd end up an adventurer after running away from his mom when she tried to tell him what to do ("he's a grown-up now!"). And being a kid, he'd get lost and not know how to get back home.
Alexandretta Ghedris, level 8 Mastermind Rogue/2 GoO Warlock.
This character started as 2 lock / 1 rogue, using mask of many faces and actor to hide her identity. She started play as the secretary type assistant to our group's fighter noble. Using subtle magic, masterful infiltration, and scheming behind the scenes with the DM, i was able to convince the group that my class was Wizard for the first few levels, and they never really questioned it since i had a few spell slots and basically only used cantrips to fight.
I made the king of a country obsessively paranoid behind my group's back. I killed off his allies by framing them, often right in front of my group's noses. I sent missives to foreign kings, who invaded at the end of this character's arc.
Alone in the throne room, my group set up their defenses. They cast their spells, and drew their swords. Suddenly, the king fell dead. My knife in his back. As the group asked why i did that, i removed the mask of many faces, revealing my identity as the daughter of the former queen whom he had executed for infidelity. I then activated my ring of invisibility, and they never saw me again. The king mysteriously couldn't be resurrected, and all of my notes were found detailing my every betrayal.
Now, somewhere in a neighboring country, there is a tiny library in a little town, run by a kindly old mage. Sitting on the front desk is a tiny silver cage, a small mote of purple light glimmering within...
I just built a Udine summoner that was a slave on a ship who fell overboard and mad a pact with an under water creature to survive. Not quite to the lvl of these characters but I'm working my way to it.
I kind of want to make a Barbarian with Tavern Brawler who cannot bring himself to use any weapon properly. So I'd do something like throw my greataxe, grapple the target as a bonus action, and then use them as my weapon for the rest of the encounter.
Similar thing could be done with a Rogue. You steal something off of the enemy and beat them to death with it.
I played a superhero called Captain Heineken... could fly by but had to shriek "Only Heineken can do this", stretching powers by uttering "Heineken reaches the parts others can't reach", had the power to turn part of the blood of everyone on a 30 yard radius to Heineken so every fight was a drunken brawl... Budweiser acted as his kryptonite... he was in a team that consisted of and invisible, deaf and mute telepath, someone who could make 10 copies of their below "average NPC", someone how had frost and fire powers, but was vulnerable to fire and frost damage, Doctor Default who had no skills but his attributes were so his his default scores were good enough and Doctor Profile who's power was he was just likeable and could talk everyone out of their criminal ways
I created a gnome who wished to be a great wizard but learned all his magic on his own. He has a random spell feature that can negatively effect his team or be really powerful