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So my buddy and I got into a discussion the other day:
I told him I was going to make a Crossblooded Sorceress using the Arcane and Marid Bloodlines.
At first, he gave the obvious "Are you sure you want to do that?" face. But then, he began to look over the two bloodlines to see why I chose them. After looking them over for a few minutes, he says, "I don't get it?"
"Get what?"
"What's the synergy?"
"The 'synergy' is the fact that this is the daughter of (Two of my characters from our home games)." [One is a Male Human Barbarian, the other is a Female Undine Bard]
Naturally, my buddy is a little taken aback. "You're going to take on all these disadvantages for your character?"
"That's what it is!" I respond, "A Character is what I'm making. Not just a Robot Soldier comprised of stats, spells, and magic items."
The conversation perpetuated for about half and hour. Ultimately, these are the two conflicting viewpoints:
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Creating a "Character" is better because it enhances roleplay, challenges the player, and allows the player to think outside standard power strategies, ultimately culminating in a true sense of accomplishment when your character succeeds.
Drawbacks: Your "character" has a slightly lower chance of survival and making mistakes could prove a bit more critical.
(This is my preference!)
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Creating a "Soldier" is better because the appropriate settings of classes, stats, combos, and items allows you to make for sure both you and your party can survive, and you're dealing great damage and utilizing decent action economy.
Drawbacks: You aren't challenged because you've probably "cookie-cutter"ed your character off some min-maxing strategy guide and you aren't experience a learning curve because you "Already know how the 'character' works"
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Which of these do you prefer doing? and Why?
Discuss!
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When it comes to PFS, can I be honest?
I go by guides, and make sure that I have a character that's powerful and sturdy. If that's making a soldier, than so be it. I'd rather have a soldier that lives past third level than a character that dies during scenario #2.
Besides, the personality of the character, and their appearance or quirks, can go far beyond a cookie-cutter build. You don't need to give a character 58 disadvantages just to have a unique character.
Seriously. I have a standard switch-hitting ranger, built straight out of a guide, and I'm not seeing how that's a bad thing. I enjoy playing her.
Competent characters are more fun, IMHO.
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Gee, I wonder which approach OP is biased towards.
"You're not intentionally weak? COOKIE CUTTER FROM A FORUM!"
I'll also point out that I do both. Every single one of my characters has a rich personality and backstory. I just don't say "I have to take a sub-par build choice because the fluff they wrote for it fits me better." Ignoring the fluff and writing your own is far more appealing than saying "Well darn it! This feat says that my character is the master of an ancient style of tribal warfare, but I wanted to be from a city! I can't take it!"
To make a long story short, why pick only one... ever? I believe that every character should be a mix of the "character" and "soldier" categories you've invented.
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This is an age old debate that has been discussed a great deal already by various gamers. There are those who prefer to min max and create a crack monkey attacking soldier type with a set of tricks to make NPC's die quickly and move on to the next fight. And then there are the people who craft a story and character, a voice and personality, and who care less about the mechanics and more for the fun of playing their character. And yes some even blend the two or are capable of shining both in combat and when talking in character is called for.
It boils down to preference and what is most fun for the player, since everyone is different. If you know how to make a Druid/Monk who can Wildshape into an Air Elemental to get that AC of 37, and then throw the badguys around the map, go for it, have fun making the GM complain how none of his NPC's can hit your PC. And if you prefer a twisted background that might not be optimal but will be a pleasure to roleplay out, then more power to you as well.
Personally I prefer to have a great character that I'll enjoy playing. I tend to try to make them great at their role via the mechanics, but I usually shy away from optimizing most of the time. Mechanics and the numbers, feats n gear can only take you so far. Building a personality, a story and breathing life into the character is more my style of gaming. But I am not going to reject another persons preference to have his min-maxed Tiefling Barbarian either. To each their own.
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Drawbacks: You aren't challenged because you've probably "cookie-cutter"ed your character off some min-maxing strategy guide and you aren't experience a learning curve because you "Already know how the 'character' works"
I'm sorry Brigg, but it's evident you have no idea what's going on in the minds of the people who aren't you, and can't conceive of goodness that manifests differently than your own.
So probably best for you to not even speculate on other people's playstyles until you learn more.
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There is no vs.
You, the player, are what give your character breadth, depth, and life. Statistics, good or bad , will not do that for you. Making a sub optimial character does not enhance your role play, at all. In gaming circles this is known as the stormwind fallacy. For the more philosophy minded, its known as the false dilema or either or fallacy.
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In your example, I see no story reason for the character to be crossblooded. A human barbarian is non-magical and bringing nothing to the fantasy genetic magic gene pool. The Undine Bard would be justification for Marid bloodline, or Elemental, or Maestro, or Arcane.
You are giving yourself a mechanical disadvantage that has no bearing on role-play.
Even if it was crucial that you have a mixed bloodline sorcerer, You could make the exact same character cross-bloodline by taking arcane heritage feats and not have reduced spells and a penalty to will saves.
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Brigg,
That's a really good question.
In an Organized Play environment, my answer is different from what it would be in a home campaign. At home, I can make a super-effective combat tank / blaster specialist / deadly archer / etc. And then the GM compensates. We start running into just the types of villains my character isn't built for. We run into tougher monsters than our party level, taken as a single number, would indicate. We rise to the challenge, and in the next session, the challenge rises to us.
Likewise, if everybody brings characters who are more flavorful than mechanically efficient, the GM compensates there, too.
In PFS, the table GM doesn't have that luxury. If you play [redacted], you'll run into a shambling mound and a nest of shocker lizards. If you're hyper-optimized against plant creatures, and you have resistance to electricity, there's still only one mound there, and he's an easy fight. If you bring in a character with a lot of disadvantages, it's still the same encounter, although now its much more difficult.
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My advice is to make sure that your PC can contribute to the party in virtually any situation, and that a weakness won't contribute to an unrecoverable failure when danger strikes.
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As a community, I hope we can provide feedback to the OP than does more than scold him for his preference.
EDIT: Ninja'd by Chris and that makes me happy :)
Brigg, I see the question you're asking and honestly, even for me after all these years, it's still an incredibly difficult one to answer.
My usual character creation process takes a few days. First, I have to find something that's mechanically interesting to me. A feat, class ability, or strange combination that hasn't been overdone in our community. This part of the process takes anywhere from an hour to several hours. I usually flip between a half dozen books, checking to make sure the weird or unique thing I want to be able to do is 100% kosher before moving forward. It's not uncommon that I'll get sidetracked by completely different builds as I'm doing this, so I make sure to note all them down on my flash drive as I work through it.
As I'm finding that "mechanical thing" that's interesting to me, I'm already thinking about how it might make a fun character.
For example, I was looking at the Divine Obedience for Irori the other day. If you don't know, it grants a +4 to all Knowledge skills. That's mechanically strong. It's also a great place to start for character building, someone that reveres the physical strength in everyone, acts kind of like a guru, etc etc. You can develop a good PC from that feat alone. Combined with a Shaman of Lore, now we're adding Wisdom to our Knowledge skills. The rest builds itself.
Once I have my mechanical trick, I develop the PC around it. I often end up with a handful of almost finished PCs, and then the one I followed through to the end.
The question of "character" vs "soldier" is difficult for me because I consider myself a skilled user of the game system. I feel that, if I ever needed to, I could build a handful of characters that really break the game or make the other PCs more or less irreverent. The challenge comes because I need to tone that back when I make PCs. The game isn't all about me. It's about us—the other players and the GM. So whenever I see something that I think is outright stupid, I'll shy away. And whenever I make a character, I always have to ask myself if this is going to be fun for everyone.
Fortunately, most of the time the answer is yes.
In the end, I've found that while a build helps define your PCs predilections, actually playing them is going to define their character. Look at the posts people have made in this thread. I think the ones with the best answers are ones that have changed their outlook on the world through active interaction with it. In other words, you might initially make a "soldier" over a "character" or the other way around, but in the end if you play them and engage in the world as it's presented to you, you'll both have good "characters" at the end of the day.
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While Brigg states it in a way that belittles those who create "soldiers", there is a real dichotemy here.
In my own mind, I think of it as creating characters vs. creating gamepieces. (Reason: one can create a soldier character that has a lot of real character, and one can create a diplomatic gamepiece that isn't terribly effective in physical combat.)
And, yes, this is an age, age, age-old discussion in RPGs. It's come back time and again, and has never really gone away. Often it comes with those who like characters feeling superior ("I ROLE play, not ROLL play" was one such tagline from a decade or two ago), and those who like gamepieces (or even who like a mix) getting ticked off by the superior attitude of those who like characters.
I suspect that the vast majority of gamers-- probably not those who actually post on messageboards, but real RPG players-- are really somewhere in between. If you really hated roleplaying altogether, no matter how much of a gamepiece-creator you are, you probably wouldn't play RPGs. Yes, there are probably some who still do because it's much harder to find a wargame nowadays, but there are other outlets (card games, etc.). And, if you really hated the mechanics and game of it all, you would almost certainly not be playing Pathfinder, you'd be playing FATE or something even system-lighter, or you'd be participating in a group writing exercise. The beauty of something like Pathfinder is that it lets you blend the enjoyement of creating a character who has quirks and drawbacks and all of that with the fun of playing a wargame or something of that ilk.
Personally, myself, most of the time I'm more of a character creator than a gamepiece creator... but I like to create chracters that are going to be able to be heroes in the kinds of stories a Pathfinder RPG is going to tell. That means I really won't start by creating a character by thinking about who the parents are, and just going from there. I'll start by thinking, what kinds of things do I want to do? I won't fully min/max for effectiveness, I will take some traits or feats for story purposes... but the story is an adventure story with heroes, not a pure Sims-like simulation of traits that come out of parent traits.
And, I do have to be honest, I find myself put off by people who are pure gamepiece-creators who completely ignore the character aspect. The term "build", which is so common, always tweaks me a little bit, because I find myself thinking, these are characters, not builds. I realize that the term has become so common that I'm overinterpreting it, but when I hear "build", I hear a focus on gamepiece creation to the exclusion of all else.
The only serious problem happens when you have extreme character creators and extreme gamepiece creators trying to play together. Most of the time, you can have a game with people at different points along the continuum work just fine, if they are able to get along out of game as people. But, if you have an extreme character creator, he's going to annoy the gamepiece creators looking for a pure tactical experience, and an extreme gamepiece creator is going to annoy people like the OP looking for a pure roleplaying experience.
My opinion on this whole debate:
Let people play as they want. If they want to build an elaborate backstory and make choices based on that backstory, let them. If they want to create a min-maxed character, let them. They like to play that way, so who are you to encroach upon their play style?
As long as you can at least contribute your part, I don't see any problem with either approach.
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Well, that went pear-shaped. I see I phrased My initial question and motives behind starting this discussion very poorly. (I guess that what I get for posting at work.)
Imbicatus: The story behind my example rests within the events that occurred in our home games between the two characters. So it's expected that the 'story reason' is elusive. ^.^
Jiggy: Maybe I do need to learn more. But who doesn't learn from making mistakes? Also, I do Know what goes on in the minds of others that aren't me. That's why my buddy and I had this conversation in the first place. And contrary to how it seems based in the original post, I do care.
All: I suppose a lot of the phrases I used, like "Cookie-Cutter" and the like, translate better between my friend and I rather than here on a public forum. Clearly, I had no intention of bashing either method of play. I was only asking which ones you all preferred. But to better rephrase the INTENDED question, (Now that I'm actually giving myself the time to think clearly):
Do you prefer creating your own storylines and canons between your characters and figure out the schematics later?
Or do you prefer to research strategies and make characters based on them?
EDIT: Also, don't get me wrong: I'm good with playing in games with either, and I really enjoy it. I was only asking the preferences of the community, and I didn't mean to come off as abrasive to those who don't share my take on it. ^____^
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Jiggy: Maybe I do need to learn more. But who doesn't learn from making mistakes?
I could probably name several, actually, but let's not focus on that. ;)
Also, I do Know what goes on in the minds of others that aren't me. That's why my buddy and I had this conversation in the first place.
Okay, so you know him. I never doubted that. Meanwhile, there's a whole wide world out there full of lots of people who might look at a crossblooded build and say "Um, are you sure you want to do that?" who think very differently from your friend.
Or to put it another way, every PC that anyone ever creates is going to fall somewhere on the optimization spectrum. Do you really think that every PC who lands in the "optimized" half was made by a player who approaches the game in the same way as your friend?
You may know why your friend cringes at a given PC's stats, but you don't know why anybody else does.
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As long as your character contributes to the overall enjoyment of all the people sitting at the table, then it's a great character.
Define "contributes" however you want.
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You can make any character interesting to role-play. There's no limitation in the rules about how you role-play or what you do with your character.
You can't make every character that was built to be interesting by introducing flaws or using sub-optimal builds into an effective combat character.
The former is an easier objective and doesn't screw over the other members of your community as they expend resources trying to keep you alive in difficult encounters. It's like the bard that ran away from every fight that someone described in a similar thread a while back. That player probably thought the role-play was awesome. The rest of his table probably thought he was an a***%@~.
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All: I suppose a lot of the phrases I used, like "Cookie-Cutter" and the like, translate better between my friend and I rather than here on a public forum. Clearly, I had no intention of bashing either method of play. I was only asking which ones you all preferred. But to better rephrase the INTENDED question, (Now that I'm actually giving myself the time to think clearly):
Do you prefer creating your own storylines and canons between your characters and figure out the schematics later?
Or do you prefer to research strategies and make characters based on them?
EDIT: Also, don't get me wrong: I'm good with playing in games with either, and I really enjoy it. I was only asking the preferences of the community, and I didn't mean to come off as abrasive to those who don't share my take on it. ^____^
You mean you (the general sense, not specifically the OP) don't want a thread arguing over an issue that inevitably carries a derision of the way some people play and thus entails people getting emotive and angry rather than respectful?
Yah, boo! I want my vitriol!To inter-character canon? I imagine a few are in the same boat on this one - when I'm in campaigns in a set world, be it homebrew or some official one, rarely are locations visited twice within a short timeframe. It is typically 2, 3 campaigns before anywhere nearby is revisited (partly to figure out what the hell the PCs impact will have been; partly because variety and spice, etc). So it makes it feel a bit moot beyond inspiration (or yet another offspring of the previous Bard).
This may upset people but I don't think a concious preference comes into it (personally enjoy getting into the hard meat of a game, however, rather than just fluff). Each, and any position on character creation, and even GM story-writing, are down to mind-set. And all the factors inherent making that.
So to put it, everyone I know who does enjoy the mechanics deeply, studies a STEM subject. Because well, demands of logical thinking styles come in. Those who lead by story-writing, tend to be more involved in fields, or work, that demands inter-personal skills, or heuristic approaches.
This is a) Anecdotal and b) Not an aspersion that one category is impaired in the methods of the other. However, it is an attempt to posit the mechanism in different approaches.
For example:
Personally I always prefer to play a character. Not a stat block on legs.
I find this an uncomfortable means (rest of post context cut for brevity) as I find it easier to care about a character once they are a stat block. Because from that stat block, I begin to be able to derive and infer certain attributes and personality. The process of building a personality, I find too derivative from my social connections if I try it before the stat block.
I do not understand why these things have to be mutually exclusive.
Admittedly, they don't - but one does, evolving the debate from exclusivity, begin to beggar - which is the chicken?; which is the egg? The suggestion that commonly, there is no bias to one or the other from players seems quixotic.
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Do you prefer creating your own storylines and canons between your characters and figure out the schematics later?
Or do you prefer to research strategies and make characters based on them?
Sometimes one, sometimes the other. Sometimes a mix of both as little choices add up and twist the execution during character creation.
My characters and their genesis:
1) Concept first: Wanted to be a older retired militia man who was the ultimate team player. As I always loved playing a Discipline Priest in WoW, the Life Oracle with Life Link, Shield Other and Channels was the perfect fit.
2) Concept first: Wanted someone who was melee-centric and the exact opposite of character #1. I enjoy pro-wrestling, so I decided a big dumb (but handsome and beautiful) wrestler would be fun. Tetori monk.
3) Concept first: Little girl, big stick. Character concept from the old anime trope of massively oversized weapons wielded by petite schoolgirls. Oracle/Paladin (perhaps to be Oracle/Skald depending on ACG).
4) Mechanics first: Wanted to play bad ass Zen Archer. Zen Archer/Inquisitor.
5) Mechanics first: Wanted to theorycraft and play a halfling grappler. Halfling Tetori.
6) Concept first: Wanted to play an old stuffy british colonel who had a companion. Made a Taldan summoner with a walking castle ("fort courageous") as his eidolon.
7) Mechanics first: Wanted to play a guy who only used a shield as his only weapon. Ranger/Horizon Walker
8) Mechanics first: Playtesting a Shaman (who is the daughter of character #1). Shaman of the Heavens.
In the bullpen:
9) Concept first: Al Pacino is the master of all magic...HOOAH! Mystic Theurge who worships Asmodeus.
10) Mechanics first: Superstitious Spell Sundering Pounce barbarian with Spellcraft and Knowledge Arcana as class skills. Barbarian.
Thing to note, all my characters are A) Mechanically sound and B) have solid RP foundations (mannerisms, motivations, etc).
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Or to put it another way, every PC that anyone ever creates is going to fall somewhere on the optimization spectrum. Do you really think that every PC who lands in the "optimized" half was made by a player who approaches the game in the same way as your friend?
You may know why your friend cringes at a given PC's stats, but you don't know why anybody else does.
It's interesting you worded it like that. Because that's exactly how my approach to my Second PFS Character rolled out.
When I first created him, I wanted him fully optimized to make use of the "Dirty Tricks" combat maneuver, while buffing and assisting with Immediate Action Spells, Bardic Performance, and Healing.
I created his stats, spells, feats and other abilities all the way up to 9th level.
He has never been armed with more than a +1 Merciful Sap, a Crowbar, a Wand of Grease, and a compendium of different ways to blind, deafen, sicken, shaken, and entangle targets. These aspects only manifested once I started playing him because I gave him a non-lethal personality and a penchant to ensure the survival of the party.
He has survived in PFS without having to kill a single intelligent being. He is now actually 9th level.
But I find this character as a good example of optimizing a character before breathing character into it. I understand both sides of the spectrum.
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Here's my short and easy guide to determine whether your character is suitable for organized play:
Ask yourself the following questions:
Do I want to play this character?
Does this character have a reason to be in the Society?
Will this character be able to contribute meaningfully to the party's success?
If I say "this is what my character would do (and/or say)", will that action jeopardize the completion of my party's mission, make people uncomfortable or otherwise disrupt the enjoyment of the entire table?
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Just because a character is well built doesn't mean it's copy-paste from a guide.
Myself - I enjoy optimizing odd roles.
First - I come up with a slightly off-kilter general character idea.
Second - I optimize the crap out of it.
If it simply can't be optimized at all - I move on to another concept. (I really wanted to make that quadraplegic monk work! :P)
This lets me power-game without being 'that guy' who stomps every encounter. The off-kilter characters aren't as powerful as the more standard styles.
I get to play a slightly odd character.
I still pull my weight. (many role-players don't)
Examples include a finesse melee bard (pretty much always has the highest AC).
Illusion based sorceror. (mostly casts silent image to put half or more foes in boxes at the beginning of the fight)
And back in 3.5 a blind towershield based fighter. (Anyone remember the combat focus tree?)
In general - your argument seems predicated on the idea that the two sides are mutually exclusive.
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This is an interesting subject although, like some other posters, I don't think it is as black or white as initially stated. I find that character concept will guide mechanical choices and that Mechanical choices will in turn guide character personality choices. All of this is a much more organic process, rather than simply being I focus on stats or personality in exclusion to the other.
With that being said that doesn't mean that there are not extremes where people do just that. As long as everyone at the table has fun there is no problem in those extremes occurring.
Roleplaying comes about not because of stats, but because of choices. Stats are there to guide a character's choices as they are probably aware of what they are good at and what they are not good at. That being said sometimes overconfidence or lack of confidence are interesting character choices. At the end of the day though, I feel that stats and choices are the gestalt from which you achieve character and that everyone has a different mix of the two in that gestalt.
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I tend to build strong characters with strong personalities. But, as with anything else, there is variability in there. Some characters don't come out as strong as I intend, some come out stronger. Some are less personable than I would like, while others have way more personality than I could have imagined. Much of this is unknown to me until I play them. And of course there is variability in how much I enjoy them. I have long known that my enjoyment of my characters rests more with their personality than with their level of optimization, but I was not sure how much more.
So I did some math.
I looked at my 7 active PFS characters plus my two characters from my most recent home games (for more data points). I assigned them a score from 1 to 5 in both Optimization and Personality, and I assigned a score from 1 to 10 in Enjoyment.
(4, 5, 10)
(5, 3, 8)
(2, 5, 10)
(5, 1, 1)
(4, 2, 6)
(5, 5, 9)
(4, 3, 2)
(4, 4, 7)
(3, 5, 10)
It is worth noting that I build what I perceive to be strongly optimized characters, by and large.
5 XXX
4 XXXX
3 X
2 X
1
I also build very strong personalities.
5 XXXX
4 X
3 XX
2 X
1 X
Then I ran a regression analysis on this small data set. What I discovered was that my characters' personality levels are slightly negatively correlated with their level of optimization. () One way to interpret this result is that approximately 25% of a character's personality can be attributed to her lack of optimization.
I also found that my enjoyment of a character was slightly negatively correlated () with their level of optimization. Apparently, even though I greatly enjoy creating optimized characters, the level of optimization has little effect on how much I enjoy playing the characters.
Lastly, and not surprisingly, I found that my enjoyment of a character was moderately to strongly () correlated with the strength of their personality. (A statistician would say that 72% of my enjoyment of a character is attributable to her personality.)
In summary, I really enjoy building strong characters. But unless they have a strong personality, I don't really enjoy playing them. Moreover, as data point 3 shows, a strong personality can even overcome the mechanical shortfalls of a character for me.
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This might be a fun little exercise...
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Here's a list of characters I've shared a table with:
• A wizard with a crossblooded sorcerer dip to deal Xd6+(2X) with damage spells, usually with some Empowering going on.
• A wizard who, at 7th level, was throwing daggers and trying to bribe powerful extraplanar creatures with 10gp worth of "fine cloth".
• A cavalier who can charge in almost any situation and regularly one-shots most baddies.
• A gunslinger who, at ~9th level, couldn't deal more than 10 damage per shot and couldn't shoot more than once per round.
• A magus with a nigh-unhittable AC and awesome damage output.
• A cleric with some pretty uber healing/buffing capabilities.
• A bard with a pretty standard buffing/fighting package.
• A crossbow ranger who could only fire every other round, instead using his axe that he couldn't hit anything with because he was built for crossbows.
Anyone wanna guess which ones made me feel like I'd met a "real" person?
While we're writing guides:
1. Can the character contribute in a meaningful way?
2. Are the other people entertaining company for me (though a difficult one to guarantee in PFS)?
I'd think that would cover the scope.
Also:
Roleplaying comes about not because of stats, but because of choices.
This to then, where n is an arbitrarily high number. A slice in time picture, a person is not.
Even more directly, you can make any character interesting to roleplay, regardless of optimization level.
That's the usual claim of the Stormwind Fallacy.
Hang on, isn't that the exact opposite? I thought the fallacy was that optimization and roleplay were mutually exclusive.
Edit joke:
Anyone wanna guess which ones made me feel like I'd met a "real" person?
Due to extreme hallucinations - every single one!
Hang on, isn't that the exact opposite? I thought the fallacy was that optimization and roleplay were mutually exclusive.That's the fallacious part of the fallacy, yes.
Ah. Caught the train of thought. My bad.
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Fun! And It makes sense, and I can get on board with what it's saying.
I didn't mean for this topic to come off as favoring one way or the other. I was merely stating my preference and asking others for theirs.
And I really, really appreciate the input that's been posted. I've learned quite a bit in this thread. ^.^
I'll definitely be more careful in the future, too! I'm not here to upset anyone.
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Don't worry Brigg, I think that most "problems" that happen online come from mis-communication. I also think that almost everything we discuss on these boards can be sorted out if you were just able to sit down with the person and chat it out, after all we just want what's best for the campaign.
So thank you for contributing to that discussion :)
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Don't worry Brigg, I think that most "problems" that happen online come from mis-communication. I also think that almost everything we discuss on these boards can be sorted out if you were just able to sit down with the person and chat it out, after all we just want what's best for the campaign.
So thank you for contributing to that discussion :)
Thanks. It's been a long time since I've joined a community forum for anything. I'm glad this place is so awesome!
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I've got characters that are min-maxed for role-play reasons first.
My witch is rather ugly and a bit blunt (cha 7) and physically unimpressive (str 7). But somewhat of a genius. She's tons of fun to play.
Of course I try to stay away from Min-maxing in general. Though I do one day want to play a sorcerer that has a familiar that's smarter than he is. Play a race with a cha bonus and int negavtive, then have insanely high cha and int 5... with the character being really pretty, and someone that people seem to like. But dumb as a rock.
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My witch is rather ugly and a bit blunt (cha 7) and physically unimpressive (str 7). But somewhat of a genius. She's tons of fun to play.
I could be wrong - but I don't think that character's legal. You can only drop 1 stat below 10 (before racial) - so you can't have more than 1 stat below 8.
If I'm mistaken - can someone else chime in?
To be more helpful, this should be broken down into two seperate questions.
How strong should my character be for PFS? How much and what kind of optimization should i invest in?
What kind of background and personality should I have in PFS?
How strong?
This is a hard question to answer, because there's no "power level" you can assign a character.
You want a character that is well above the pregens. Those things are simply going to die, and get the rest of your party killed as soon as you hit the 5-9s. You need to be able to carry your party a bit if you get sat down with some underpowered characters.
You want a character built strong enough to hit the 1-5's like a mac truck, because if you don't, the 7-11s are going to flatten you.
You want a character thats below
-A slumber hex happy witch with a maxed out slumber hex dc.
-A min maxed zen archer
-A pair of pouncing velociraptors druid/pet.
-The dazing channel cleric
-The daze happy fireball chucker.
These characters are just going to mow through the scenarios.
What KIND of optimization?
PFS throws a lot of adventuring basics at you. Swarms, damage reduction, swarms, unbeatable damage reduction, swarms, darkness, blindness, energy damage, swarms,inorporeal creatures, invisibility, energy drain, swarms, flying opponents, oozes... you want to be able to handle everything to SOME degree more than you want to be able to roflcopter 90% of encounters.
You want to be able to step into multiple roles. You could have no healer in the party. You may have NO melee. You have have NO ranged and come up against flying harpies. Versatility is its own power.
What kind of role play?
Some long term, sweeping epic of you and a 50 page backrgound with NPCs you have complex, wonderful and subtle interactions with is pretty useless in pfs. You keep changing DMs, the dm usually can't fit your background into the story, and they have more things on their mind.
If you want your character to stand out or even show a personality, something thats a little over the top and that you can sum up quickly is going to work better than a wall flower or some deeply nuanced, multi layer onion.
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RPG Superstar 2012 Top 32
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You can only drop 1 stat below 10 (before racial) - so you can't have more than 1 stat below 8.
If I'm mistaken - can someone else chime in?
You could probably answer this yourself by checking the Core Rulebook's description of the point-buy process and seeing whether it says anything about such a limit.
My witch is rather ugly and a bit blunt (cha 7) and physically unimpressive (str 7). But somewhat of a genius. She's tons of fun to play.
I could be wrong - but I don't think that character's legal. You can only drop 1 stat below 10 (before racial) - so you can't have more than 1 stat below 8.
If I'm mistaken - can someone else chime in?
Nope. Not a rule at all.
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Generally speaking, for PFS and other organized play, the odds are very high that your character will be reduced (by the other players, at least) to his mechanics anyways. Unless you play with a regular organized group, where personalities and RP can come to the forefront over time, folks aren't going to care too much about your character backgrounds or motivation, so much as they're gonna wanna know what you can do for the party.
So long as you enjoy playing the character you've made, they're like a Reeses' Cup. There's no wrong way to make a character.
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You want a character thats below
...
These characters are just going to mow through the scenarios.
These two statements are incompatible for me. If by "mow through the scenarios" you mean curbstomp all combats without challenge or worry, then that's not the kind of character that I want, nor that I really want to be playing with.
One must be effective, yes.
You do not have to overdo it, however.
-Rob
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RPG Superstar 2012 Top 32
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You want a character thats below
...
These characters are just going to mow through the scenarios.
These two statements are incompatible for me. If by "mow through the scenarios" you mean curbstomp all combats without challenge or worry, then that's not the kind of character that I want, nor that I really want to be playing with.
One must be effective, yes.
You do not have to overdo it, however.
-Rob
That would be why he said you want a character "below" them.
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Generally speaking, for PFS and other organized play, the odds are very high that your character will be reduced (by the other players, at least) to his mechanics anyways. Unless you play with a regular organized group, where personalities and RP can come to the forefront over time, folks aren't going to care too much about your character backgrounds or motivation, so much as they're gonna wanna know what you can do for the party.
So long as you enjoy playing the character you've made, they're like a Reeses' Cup. There's no wrong way to make a character.
One Reeses Cups are gross and make me puke and give me headaches
secondly, what sort of groups have you been playing with? I've run in several different groups, and my characters have never been reduced to their mechanics. Simple fact is, two characters built with exactly the same stats, and exactly the same class may react to exactly the same situation in very different ways.
For example, my boyfriend and I run twin cavaliers. They don't act exactly the same in combat, or do the exact same things.
Generally speaking I do both. Sometimes I get a "character" idea, and sometimes I get a "build" idea. Either way I try to give both an actual personality, and I try to make sure they are useful to the party.
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Usually when I sit down to play my aforementioned Cad/Daredevil, I like to introduce him to the group so they know what he's about:
He refuses to kill anything above animal intelligence. The exception to this rule is the preferred elimination of maliciously evil outsiders bent on death, destruction, etc. Better to ensure the survival of innocent masses.
If the enemy is human, he uses Dirty Tricks to hinder the foes, while using Diplomacy to try and talk them down from fighting. "We really don't need any casualties. Your lives can serve a greater purpose than this." But if he has to resort to the Sap, he will.
Against tougher stuff, He sticks to the back while dancing away with "Derring-Do"; healing those who need it; and supporting with Immediate Action spells like "Liberating Command", "Saving Finale", and "Gallant Inspiration".
Though his damage output is very minimal, his ability to ensure the survival of the party, and making sure attacks hit allows the heavy hitters to strike sure almost every time has made him very welcome in my PFS groups.
And it feels really good when you see an ally fail a Will Save against "Slay Living", interrupt with Saving Finale to allow them a reroll, and have the ally succeed on the reroll. It's a beautiful thing!
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Do you prefer creating your own storylines and canons between your characters and figure out the schematics later? Or do you prefer to research strategies and make characters based on them?
Personally, I fall into what seems to be the "old skool" category in that I build the character's personality, theme, etc. first. I need an inspiration before I create a PC. I will typically write a paragraph to a page (or more) of history or background on a character before I grab my CRB. For me, I need to know how or why a character is what they are. Where did they come from? How have their experiences influenced what they have become. And what are their motivations and goals moving forward.
Then I am comfortable building the statistics that make that character come alive. Sometimes that might mean a non-optimized choice, but even though my character is story-driven, I will try to chose abilities that optimize its role so it can adequately contribute to the party's success.
My preference is to have a character that is really good at a couple of things, good at a few more, and average on most others, with a couple of weaknesses they have to overcome. For me, that gives a character, well, character.
In my experience, this approach is more prevalent in home games where there is more cooperation amongst the players to have a cohesive group with a common story. I see it much less in the environment of organized play where you are an individual thrown in with others for a brief moment in their adventuring career and less able to blend game mechanics. Not to mention, due to time restraints, a character's background is more difficult to bring out.
Persoanlly, I don't care if form follows function or vice versa as long as the player knows what the character can/not do and is prepared to contribute to the overall fun of the game. Regardless of your approach you have a responsibility to not dominate the game such that the other players cannot contribute and you need to be able to carry your weight so not to be a burden on the party.
It has been said ad nauseam, Role-Play is not mutually exclusive from Roll-Play.
Explore! Report! Cooperate!
EDIT--one thing I recommend, regardless of your build preferences, is to have a good intro for your character. Much of your time will be spent will players who do not know you or your character. Initially, all they will know is what you tell them. If you describe your character strictly from a statistic perspective, it won't sound alive. Avoid saying things like, "I am [fighter] with an 18 strength and a greatsword." Try to be more descriptive of their appearance, attitude, and demeanor. You can include stat-based material, but try to do it descriptively rather than simply with numbers and mechanics. YMMV.