I'm considering trying a play a game of 5th edition as a character who is a pacifist. So in combat I would basically just provide buffs and/or healing.
More importantly though I'm interested to know how you guys would approach this. Is it even feasible? What is the best class or setup to go with? Would it be stupid to play this way in a game about murder hobos or just annoy the party in general?
Why.
Justify yourself sufficiently.
That shtick is gonna get old really fast, and your party is going to get more and more annoyed as time goes on, because you can only keep up one Concentration spell at a time in 5e, and unless somebody is hurt, you're basically doing nothing.
You should go Wizard. Abjuration/Divination/Illusion are really good for this.
That was my main sticking point. While I think this would be fun, I dont wanna piss of whole party off.
I think this is a neat idea. I was thinking alternative combat would be the way to go.
This sort of archetype is annoying to people even if murdering everything on sight isn't their approach to things. There's pacifism and then there's attempting to avoid violence as much as possible. A pacifist would not defend themselves even if they were attacked, so unless that's what you're going for you might want to be careful using the word 'pacifist'.
A better archetype would be something like a manipulative diplomat who attempts to get everyone to fight for him while providing some form of support, while also being something like the party's face who attempts to diffuse situations as best as possible. Normally this can work unless the NPCs you face are murderish.
pacifist was the best word I could think of but basically the only tenant of that I want to stick to is that the character abhors doing violence and finds other means i.e. putting the person to sleep or something like that.
In a party the character would understand that violence is way much of the world works, even if they don't agree with it, so they would not necessarily hate party members who decide it would be best to murder stuff and would help them as best they can.
I think Enchantment Wizard might be a good choice as well.
Are trying to go for someone who is opposed to killing, or just someone who objects to violence?
Because even though thou shalt not kill, the good book is a little grey when it comes to the matter that of kneecaps.
I was thinking someone who is purely against doing harm.
>justify yourself
>you're basically doing nothing
As if we needed more confirmation that 5e was trash. A lot of systems would have no trouble with this, and I say that as someone that played a pacifist in fucking Warhammer.
Generally, pacifism is about not doing harm, not just not killing, but it's a fair point that some faiths could have completely different conceptions about it.
Such as purification theough pain, you could be absolving them of their sins by means of torture, but still refuse to kill because it's not your place to do so, God's plan, every life is precious, etc.
I am sorta loving the idea of "God said nothing about your kneecaps" now.
Ask your DM, if such character would be feasible in his campaign.
Frankly, i personally feel default DnD is not suited for such characters and would avoid playing one. You dont need to be trigger happy murderhobo, but you certainly should be able and willing to fight (and hurt stuff) when appropriate.
>Life cleric
>Party will love you
>DM will hate you.
This was sort of along the lines (apart from that weird torture tangent) what I played recently: Killing animals if no other solution was possible was ok, and mindless or inherently evil non-persons, like demons and aberrants etc, had to be killed since there's no redeeming those fucks..
Evil or criminal sentients had to be captured alive and turned over to the athorities, which is why my group threw a shitfit when I broke the arms of every unconscious Phandolin Redbrand I kept the party from slaughtering. :D
They were 14+ against our 4, how'd we supposed to keep them controlled in the prison cell?
>personally fighting is bad
>helping my friends varnish the floor with your brains is A-ok
Unless you're trying to play a hypocritical asshole, it breaks suspension of disbelief.
>the authorities
On the medieval frontier you are the authorities, user. That's just displacing responsibility.
>He didn't turn in the Black Widow over to Sildar
Sorry about that xp loss, senpai :
Besides not being as effective no matter what class you pick, staying with the group when they do want to kill and are very far from pacifism is the problem most of the time. Jesus doesn't go to a mercenary company, and it's really hard to justify if he does.
One can choose to refrain from using violence themselves while not forcing that belief on others. Especially in the case where the character understands they are fighting baddies.
That's not hypocrisy it's just a difference on how to approach life, unless you are an ass hole about it.
Pacifism is not always about religion.
Right now I'm leaning towards a wizard that uses enchantment/illusion to disarm, disable, and charm enimies.
Jesus was just a comparison, doesn't have to be anything religious about it. But justifying a complete pacifist joining a bunch of murderhobos, mercenaries, adventurers, whatever the flavor of the game is, is very hard to justify. Wizards have a lot of CC, walls are good though you wouldn't be able to use fire wall etc., paralyzation and other debuffs are numerous and if you don't use them you'll be quite gimped.
Yeah, I think it's safe to assume in this given scenario the character isn't a total pacifist but still stands by not doing harm themselves.
I agree, I think cc is the way to go now. I don't think healing and buffs are enough to justify combat loss.