We all know the usual themes people use to personalize their character, you've got your big meatheaded Fighters, you've got your nerdy Wizards, you've got your greedy Rogues, etc.
We also know about the character deviations that are also fairly standard: Your "big character but meek personality" beatstick, your Rogue could secretly have a heart of gold and steals to donate to charity, and maybe your wizard isn't just a nerd but actually wants to gather knowledge so he can enact his scheme to rule the world.
This isn't about either of those categories. In this thread, tell us about your characters that are so out of the ordinary that it's difficult to even define exactly what character tropes they'd fit in without having to make an entire TVTropes page for them.
I don’t have much intelligent to add to this discussion, but I’d just like to point out that “non-standard... archetype” is a contradiction of terms.
Jordan Smith
"non-standard characterizations" then.
Jaxon Nguyen
Could you give an example?
Noah Anderson
"Non standard characters" are why I infinitely prefer systems with straight combat stats like Physical attack, Physical Defence, Magic Attack, ect instead of DnD's attribute system.
Playing a wizard who's maybe not that smart and just "feels" out the spells and has a ton of mana to back them is fun as fuck. Playing the fighter who's maybe not super strong but excessively fast and precise is fun as fuck. Man, even just being able to play aFighter who's Charismatic instead of a meatheaded brute would be fun.
Too bad it's basically impossible to do in DnD and 80% of the TTRPG industry that's trying to BE DnD without horribly crippling yourself mechanically. The lack of replies in this topic is proof enough of that.
Juan Roberts
>Man, even just being able to play a Fighter who's Charismatic instead of a meatheaded brute would be fun.
Charisma as an attribute is one of my least favorite trends about TTRPGs in general, since Charisma is the "do I get to participate in non-combat roleplay" stat. There's a reason DnD 5e has more Charisma-based classes than any other stat, unfortunately.
Brandon Wilson
I suppose I could. For instance, a friend of mine once played a Sorcerer that, despite being incredible at social situations, was a complete dimwit everywhere else, and even attended (and subsequently flunked out of) a Wizard training school. Even though the magic required to cast his spells comes from his own bloodline, he still carries around a spellbook from back in his school days to remind himself of how certain spells are supposed to "work", especially if it's anything other than the classic spell for him to use: Hold Person.
Aiden Cruz
>Playing a wizard who's maybe not that smart and just "feels" out the spells and has a ton of mana to back them is fun as fuck. Sorcerer, Psion, etc >Playing the fighter who's maybe not super strong but excessively fast and precise is fun as fuck Swashbuckler, Swordsage, etc >uck. Man, even just being able to play aFighter who's Charismatic instead of a meatheaded brute would be fun. Crusader
Aiden Gray
>>uck. Man, even just being able to play aFighter who's Charismatic instead of a meatheaded brute would be fun. Also Hexblade and Zhentarium.
Lucas Johnson
Half that shit is literally Homebrew and not official content. DnD isn't a good game just because you make up imaginary rules to "fix" it.
Jace Perez
>Half that shit is literally Homebrew and not official conte All the classes I listed are offical classes. For someone complaining about homebrew, you sure as fuck do not know the fucking game. >DnD isn't a good game just because you make up imaginary rules to "fix" it. D&D isn't a bad game because you parrot opinions on /t/g without actually playing it.
Lincoln Parker
The larger problem with DnD-styled games in particular is that every class is based on one or two stats and mechanically rewarded for dumping the others. This mean every single fighter is going to take the same stats, every single wizard is going to be the same, every single rougue is gonna be the same. The fact that Charisma, Wisdom, and Intelligence are personality traits rather than physical traits only compounds this problem by dictating your character's personality for you.
>All the classes I listed are offical classes. Objectively false. I know you DnDrones feel super compelled to defend your dumpster fire of a blight on the industry as a whole, but lying about it is weak-bait and even weaker "argument".
Noah Allen
>Charisma as an attribute is one of my least favorite trends about TTRPGs in general, since Charisma is the "do I get to participate in non-combat roleplay" stat
Yeah but that applies to basically any given stat, doubly so mental ones. 4e did a very good job on that front, with a LOT written about basically 'Make sure that you are not putting all your eggs in a single stat basket when you design non-combat encounters'. Like giving an example during an infiltration of a fighter using Athletics to quietly subdue a guard or two (That wasn't worth an actual battle) or getting attention during a social encounter with Endurance by telling stories about where you got all your awesome adventurer scars.
Crusader and Swordsage were 3.5 TOB classes and Psion is Expanded Psionics Handbook.
Jordan Brooks
>Objectively false. I know you DnDrones feel super compelled to defend your dumpster fire of a blight on the industry as a whole, but lying about it is weak-bait and even weaker "argument".
You know there are editions other than 5e, right? Also D&D classes:
>Swordmage >Warlord >Warden >Seeker
Matthew Parker
>People still treat 3.Pathfinder like legitimate examples of good game design.
William Parker
Are you literally fucking retarded? >en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Character_class_(Dungeons_&_Dragons) All of those classes have existed in 3.5 and below. 5e and it's shitty want to be lord of the rings bullshit isn't the only game out there. Get your head out of your ass and play something else instead of jerking off about how terrible D&D, YOU DUMB FUCKING NIGGER WHO CANT BE BOTHERED TO DO BASIC RESEARCH. He doesn't because he's never played or discussed the game outside of Veeky Forums hatred circle jerks.
Austin Thompson
Apparently he also doesn't know about a little ol' thing called expansion books, that's clearly a screencap of the Core rulebook.
Hudson Peterson
All of those classes are mechanically sound. More so than the Player Handbook classes in 3.5. 3.PF is actually okay if you ignore the core classes, since those tend to be the most broken.
Alexander Wright
>is actually okay if you ignore the core classes, since those tend to be the most broken. And by Broken, I mean over and underpowered. There are some other outliers but the game is pretty pleasant when you restrict caster types to Psionics, Incarnum, and themed casters like Dread Necromancer, Warlock, Warmage, Healer, and Beguiler.
It's hyper vague classes that get literally everything like Cleric, Druid, Wizard, and prestige that interface directly with them that break things. I'm not going to argue 3.5 had good game design, but it's not this flaming trash heap like Veeky Forums likes to make it out to be either.
Jackson Butler
I like the fact that this thread devolved into arguing over DND
Grayson Miller
Sure, if you like Casters being gods who have a dozen different ways to interact with the world, roleplay, and tackle problems while all martials could do is hit things and maybe trip an opponent if they have a string of 3 or 4 feats that allow them to do so.
Although 5 still has this problem too, where Casters have a ton of ways to interact with the world whereas everyone has extremely niche abilities that rely on "DM may I?" to work.
Michael Green
To be honest, something else needs to dominate the industry for awhile. DnD isn't even as bad as people make it out to be, but it's stale as fuck and haven't evolved with the times very well. It's just got marketing momentum and pop-culture credit keeping it relevant, much to the detriment of games with new and interesting ideas that really should be allowed to see the light of day but don't because DnD is all anyone plays.
THIS is why there's so much DnD hate-circlejerking on Veeky Forums.
And to be honest, I kinda agree with most of it.
Hudson Long
>Sure, if you like Casters being gods who have a dozen different ways to interact with the world, roleplay, and tackle problems while all martials could do is hit things and maybe trip an opponent if they have a string of 3 or 4 feats that allow them to do so. Except the later classes actually fix this, by making casters much more limited. Again, you don't know what the fuck you're talking about. Psionics, Incanrum, and classes like Warmage and Beguiler severely limits a casters moveset. And classes like Warblade, Crusdaer, etc increases a martial's moveset both in and out of combat.
Brandon Parker
>It's just got marketing momentum and pop-culture credit keeping it relevant, much to the detriment of games with new and interesting ideas that really should be allowed to see the light of day but don't because DnD is all anyone plays. If find this isn't actually true. Those "new and interesting ideas", in practice, aren't that interesting and fail to really do anything that distinguishes it from D&D in a meaningful way that makes people want to change systems if only for a while.
Austin Turner
>all these classes introduced after core casters fix the problem of casters! >even though the offending casters are still core Sounds pretty familiar.
Jaxon Bailey
>Those "new and interesting ideas", in practice, aren't that interesting and fail to really do anything that distinguishes it from D&D in a meaningful way that makes people want to change systems if only for a while.
Except I can name half a dozen games I'd rather play than DnD... if only I could fin other people that wanted to play them. But nope it's always "Well, I only know DnD." It's the fucking Call of Duty of Tabletop games. Utterly mediocre, but it's the game where everyone's friends are so everyone keeps playing it.
Owen Bell
>>even though the offending casters are still core Because you can easily ignore them, since most caster concepts in core can be mimicked by the later classes while still being more mechanically sound. RPG core books aren't dogma, it's all a tool box to be used and discarded as needed.
Zachary Cook
>Except I can name half a dozen games I'd rather play than DnD.. That's nice. That has nothing to do with what I stated. >but it's the game where everyone's friends are so everyone keeps playing it. This is fucking crazy, but have you considered that people play Call of Duty because they actually fucking like it? And if no one really liked Call of Duty, no one would play it?
Landon Powell
>People legit defending Call of Duty as a good game.
Man, I thought this had hit a peak when people were defending 3.PF as good game design, but this keeps getting better and better. Please continue you two.
Jonathan Adams
>But nope it's always "Well, I only know DnD." Have you tried getting them to do something that's not fantasy. If you tried to get them to play another fantasy RPG, but the only positives are "you're way shittier and worthless than you would be in D&D and it's so much grittier" then no shit that's going to be a hard sell for most people. The whole "I only know D&D" shit is a piss poor excuse because these people didn't know D&D at one point and that didn't stop them.
Have you considered the games you want to play, just aren't appealing?
Luke Roberts
I'm not saying it's a good game, but to pretend the games are entirely without merit would also be false. Some of them were good at one point.
And even then, there are plenty of good games that receive massive recognition. Dark Souls. Darkest Dungeon. Witcher? And yet these "new and interesting" rpg ideals always remain obscure hipster shit? Wonder why? Call of Duty isn't "stifling" anything and neither is D&D.
Oliver Cruz
> I'm not going to argue 3.5 had good game design, but it's not this flaming trash heap like Veeky Forums likes to make it out to be either. And I love how anti-D&D fags literally can't fucking read and are only capable of repeating the same old arguments parroted thread after thread after thread.
Robert Sanchez
You had the best intentions OP, I am sure of it. But the results just came in, this thread has turned into a dumpster fire. I am sorry for your loss.
Adrian Peterson
Can't win 'em all I suppose. I would have tried to start things off right with an example of my own but I didn't want to force things too hard.
Daniel Ward
3.5 and PF are fine, even if they're not to my taste. You basically have to make the following choices when playing though:
>You acknowledge the power gap between classes and the players all agree to create a party composed of classes with a similar power level >You throw out all the core classes
In the latter case, this fixes 3.5 pretty well and mostly sorts PF if you drop shit like the Arcanist and Witch alongside the 'big 5' from core (Wiz, Sorc, Cleric, Druid and, less so obviously, the Oracle). The classes individually aren't terribly designed, they're just not all balanced against each other and the pitfall is that both 3.5/PF don't acknowledge this.
Asher Roberts
>Playing the fighter who's maybe not super strong but excessively fast and precise is fun as fuck
