Fear of Creativity

[@zubbworks]

You wanna play a wizard? That's a fighter, with a book.

[@BanditsKeep]

Indeed

[@Batterydennis]

This is literally the loneliest generation out there. Makes it so hard to ditch a group that you aren't jiving with, but Daniel is right letting go to continue to find a group that will work for you. It will be worth. And if you can't trust someone with male pattern baldness confidently maintaining a long hair style, who can you trust?

[@someguy403]

Yeah I agree. I had to leave my old friend group because I got tired of how they treated me. Now I only have one friend and am pretty much limited to solo play since he and I can't meet up often but it's a whole lot better being away from a harmful social group. I know I could probably find a group online to play D&D with but I really would prefer an IRL group so I might have to start my own club at the public library.

[@justinblocker730]

The hardest part probably isn't getting a group together, it's getting a space to play in. A place with a table, lights hopefully, and a toilet nearby that isn't my own hovel.

[@elfbait3774]

Tell me about it. I had to leave my group behind due to life needs and moved a thousand miles away from them and everything I knew. finding new gaming buddies at 50+ is daunting, but i am determined to make it happen.

[@BanditsKeep]

😊

[@isaace8090]

@@elfbait3774 find an online group. I've been playing with the same group (5) for a decade. Our ages range from mid 40s-60. Most of this crew my cousin scrounged up from RPG Codex. We have used Fantasy Grounds, Roll20, and the Forge VTT. We have been using mostly Roll20 for the past 2+ years and they have recently made a lot of improvements. Except for my cousin, none of us have met in person.

[@elfbait3774]

I think it's important to remember that even some of the core classes were, at one time, just some player's crazy idea that didn't exist in the game's original form. As for odd characters. I played essentially a Batman type superhero in AD&D in a city campaign. I used the Acrobat class and had the character running around in a cape and cowl, weilding twin scimitars and a bunch of tricks in pouches. It was a great solo campaign and the character really worked.

[@BanditsKeep]

That sounds really fun

[@benjaminholcomb9478]

I'm running an Aaracokra battlemaster who has special plate mail that lets him fly. My brother wanted the Aaracokra to be like mandalorians, so i obliged. He uses a glaive and took the ambush manuever so that he could be sneaky still, and use some shock and awe.

[@BanditsKeep]

Nice

[@danielgoldberg5357]

I think another video on DM creativity is such a great idea. I think so many of us DMs feel we just need to create another Forgotten Realms or Greyhawk, and shy away from the really crazy gonzo ideas we might have because they are "too weird."

[@BanditsKeep]

For sure

[@sw33n3yto00]

I enjoy taking a 5e player and handing them the Basic Fantasy rules book, to watch the confusion on their face. "But I want to play a Warlock!' Once they understand that they can build the Warlock they want instead of one they are told to play, they dive in.

[@BanditsKeep]

For sure

[@NegativeHeadspace]

My current character is a young man of 19 called "farmer" though hes been a sheep herder his entire life. He religiously prays at sunrise every day. He is an aspiring acolyte. Hes a fighter that acts like a cleric, basically.

[@someguy403]

I have a similar concept for a character. He doesn't necessarily want to be a cleric but he's trying to be a "man of faith" despite not having any magical powers so he looks for any signs he can that point to a higher power/purpose. Kind of like John Locke from Lost.

[@ahabicher]

Haha, fun! I have a character called "Silas the Exile" - a cleric with anger issues who was not allowed to level up in the temple but got sent forth into the world to find balance. So he was a very religious fighter who constantly felt unworthy of being the cleric he was meant to be, never realizing that he was actually long worthy. He was faithful and preachy, cleric in all but name, yet with an inferiority complex about his true calling.

[@BanditsKeep]

Love it

[@chrischaplin3126]

A character that I've noodling on for years, the son of the owners of a tavern known for alcoholic drinks with potion effects. Trained in brewing them and expected to take over the business. One day he sets off to a nearby town to buy ingredients they need. Only to find this town he's been to many times no longer knows of him or his town. When he tries to go back his town, his family, the cute girl apprenticed to the local wizard aren't there. No sign of any buildings or people. Leaving the question did something erase them but miss him, did something alter his memories, or is he mad? And he's forced into adventure, desperately looking for his home or anyone he knows.

[@solohelion]

Cool idea

[@Xplora213]

Write this up… it’s got Studio Ghibli all over it 👌

[@BanditsKeep]

I love this - I could see as a player leaving those answers up the the DM to keep myself guessing

[@benjaminholcomb9478]

"...that's a fighter." Chuckled quite a bit at that

[@BanditsKeep]

😊

[@beardyben7848]

Gyorgy is a paladin of the Morning Lord who only wields weapons against monsters or undead. He will wrestle, or use unarmed strikes against humanoids and he is willing to use a stick against animals, but he doesn't like it. Lethal combat is only for the non-negotiable threats. Keep the other players fun in mind, but give your characters personal codes, and deal with the complications!

[@justinblocker730]

5E has everyone being super heroes... I made a character that will eat anything they kill so they only Knock out anything or try to help in other ways.

[@BanditsKeep]

Fun

[@BanditsKeep]

I would think most super heroes don’t kill their enemies

[@amenditman]

Vadek, dwarven fighter in a B/X based sandbox. Trying to do the right thing and get the remains of friends who were attacked on the road recovered and sent back home for proper burial. Found 2 trolls eating the oxen from their wagon. Unfortunately, the trolls sensed him and his companions, 1st level party, and it was almost a TPK. But we had a great couple of sessions playing them.

[@BanditsKeep]

Fun!

[@stiltonavenger]

Love this. I blended a Barbarian and Wild Magic Sorcerer. I was worried it would be low powered and no fun to play but had an awesome GM who helped him work. He was a lizardfolk barbarian who have a cleaver lodge it his head and stuck. It gave him wild magic. And he would pull on the hilt to rage.

[@BanditsKeep]

Nice!

[@colemcmullen3904]

A sentient flesh golem composed of the remains of 13 different people, the ghosts of whom are haunting him. He needs to find a way to appease their spirits so they can rest. Each has their own unique needs that must be addressed, but at least one wants the character's creator brought to justice.

[@danielrowan4716]

This is a really awesome concept. Is the sentient golem a 14th soul or is it a highly aware elemental spirit or still something else? Do the various ghost take control and bestow different class or racial abilities? The possibilities for role play on this are truly endless.

[@BanditsKeep]

Nice

[@colemcmullen3904]

​@@danielrowan4716 All good questions. lol Like you said, though, there are so many ways you could play them. Personally, I'm not looking for them to be over-powered, so I'd just make them a stock human mechanically. It could justify the character having a eclectic assortment of skills and hobbies, though.

[@danielrowan4716]

@@colemcmullen3904 it’d be a Swiss Army character. Super extra bonus points if it had different genders / races / ages etc…

[@colemcmullen3904]

@@danielrowan4716 Absolutely. There's a lot of license to be creative with who the ghosts were, and maybe even interpersonal drama between some of the ghosts.

[@dennisthornton4434]

True, love creativity. 😊

[@BanditsKeep]

Yes!

[@Joshuazx]

Gary Stew, fighter. Family forced to flee the ruins of their village and were attacked by brigands in the wilderness. He survived, and is unaware that any of them survived, but will be headed to the place they agreed to meet if ever they go separated, the city of Garland. Impressed by a band of mercenaries along the way and given minimal training with martial weapons, shield, and armor. Fought in a battle for a cause he didn't believe in three kingdoms away. Managed to survey and return with a new friend and mentor he made with one of the mercenaries, John Doe, who dies from his wounds along the way. On his way Garland, now further away than ever, but able to make the trek.

[@BanditsKeep]

Cool

[@GregMcNeish]

Over the years I've received kudos from several DM/GMs & fellow players for bringing creative characters into my games. One player described my creation process as, "just throwing plot hook after plot hook to the GM." I wear that as a badge of honour. What I consider my most creative characters came from an old Star Wars RPG (2nd ed) forum from the younger days of the internet. The community hosted many discussion board games at a time, mostly unrelated to each other (since the galaxy is so enormous) but understood to all be in the same universe. We ran in the post-Thrawn age with a 2nd Empire contesting with the New Republic, with PCs playing on both sides of the conflict, as well as unaffiliated campaigns for all the smugglers and bounty hunters to enjoy. The first character I made for that community that really felt like I'd embraced my creativity was an Imperial Navy Captain, who took what I considered to be a truly novel spin on an old trope: I played a GOOD character in an EVIL campaign. His backstory was growing up in Cloud City, which obviously came under Imperial occupation in Empire Strikes Back, but came under Hutt control after the death of the Emperor. I imagined this transition for a kid on the ground as going from a highly regulated environment under the Empire to a "street justice" environment ruled by competing gangs under the Hutts. As a result, my character grew up longing for the peace and security that comes from an ordered, strictly lawful society, and so joined up with the reborn Empire for conscientious reasons. He saw the Empire as a force for good, representing ideals that were worth fighting for, both from external forces that represented chaos and from bad actors within that poisoned the ideal. If he were a D&D character, he would have been a Paladin, and perhaps even one that fell into "lawful stupid" territory, thinking nothing of executing people in his charge who didn't uphold his standards of lawfulness. What made it work so well was the "evil" setting he lived in, where extrajudicial execution and even wholesale slaughter to serve a purpose was both expected and celebrated. I loved the freedom that discussion posts afforded to go on long monologues about truth, justice and the Imperial way, especially in lectures to his crew. What may be my crown jewel was a pair of characters that I played separately, twin brothers with Force sensitivity. I leaned into the real-life trope of twins having a sort of almost-telepathy because they think so much alike, and made them as being intrinsically connected through the Force, from the womb into life and presumably forevermore after death. They grew up in a backwater farming settlement where their power was discovered during a childhood episode where one got lost in the woods with a friend and the other was able to lead the search party directly to them thanks to their bond. This caught the attention of the Dark Jedi who were constantly looking to recruit. The big backstory twist was that when a Jedi tried to rescue the boys from the Dark Jedi recruiter, the brothers chose opposite sides, one going with each in a heartbreaking split. Their Force connection could never be broken, though, and they retained a telepathic link (similar to the connection Rey & Kilo Ren in the recent movies, but I did it two decades ago), often sharing dreams, getting flashes of real scenes through the other's eyes, and getting snippets of communications blasting in their minds, like unbidden telegrams. The rift created by their Light/Dark split created a feedback that made it unbearable to be anywhere near each other, though. The closer they got, the louder and more chaotic became the mental noise, so while they pursued their Jedi/Dark Jedi paths, they maintained as much separation as possible, because proximity was unbearable (and perhaps dangerous). Because of the multi-campaign nature of the group, I was able to play BOTH characters in separate campaigns, where I would sprinkle telepathic interactions into my posts for flavour that drew upon actual experience from the other campaign (nothing useful, mind you), while the GMs would add whatever flashes or dreams they felt appropriate to serve their respective campaigns. Playing both sides of that situation was endlessly fascinating, and I loved every minute of it. I never got into GMing in that group (starting that journey many years later), but I always envisioned incorporating those characters as NPCs in a Star Wars campaign of my own. Frankly, I still do envision that, if I ever get back to the Star Wars universe.

[@BanditsKeep]

Very cool. Not sure I see how the first PC was good though. Seems like a classic evil who thinks they are good setup. - which is cool, I’d just love to hear the “good” part

[@TwinSteel]

My favorite example is from Order of the Stick - samurai are leveled in paladin - when I learned that, I realized the rules were just there to help us make the game we want to play - I love seeing what’s possible within the rules, but we lose out by dogmatically adhering to “the right way to play.” - for me there were phases - start off wanting to do things that aren’t directly in the rules - move on to understanding the rules and exploring what they allow you to do - learn to use the rules to allow you to do what isn’t explicitly allowed in the game - decide the rules are only there to serve the group and change them to suit our table

[@BanditsKeep]

For sure

[@OldZean]

"what is it you want to do with your character" that's what I ask my players at character creation. Then we pick a class together that fits that and make adjustments as needed. That also helps with campaign building. I can give the players stuff to do they are interested in

[@BanditsKeep]

For sure!

[@ReignOfHazards]

Great video as always, Daniel! My favorite character, Ghrezzd, was a young, impetuous magic-user in AD&D 1e who was mentored by a wizened, yet failing arch-wizard who who lived in an ancient tower in the mountains and was tormented by hallucinations of his past... all the companions he lost over the years. After 6 years, the character had reached 9th level and was the heir-apparent to the tower. His group then was forced to travel roughly 50 years into the past on a quest via a spell the master knew. Ghrezzd was the only one to survive the final encounter, miraculously. Unable to return to his own time, he tried to track down his mentor to ask for help but found the tower in disrepair and the mentor no where to be found. In the epilogue to the campaign, Ghrezzd decided to claim the tower, research the time-travel spell and wait for his master to arrive. Our GM then revealed that Ghrezzd was the master! Years later, our GM admitted that it was by total luck that story worked out that way. Only after we suggested researching the spell and waiting, did the GM come up with the conclusion. So, many parts of our 6 year campaign came into a new light after that conclusion.

[@BanditsKeep]

Fantastic!

[@danielgoldberg5357]

My character is Grimgy Tonstar, a gnome armorer artificer - he is from Eberron but was banished to Sigil when it was found that he had stolen his father's armorer notes. He is basically a little gnome Iron Man, e.g., his magic missile spell is little rocket launchers on his shoulders, etc. His goal is to amass enough money to triumphantly return to Eberron and take over his father's weapons business, once he can actually figure out how to get back to Eberron. So fun to play. Super smart and charismatic too. Very physically weak but his power armor makes up for it!

[@BanditsKeep]

Nice

[@RayOtus]

I’m playing a cool androgynous illusionist (good band name) and I’m all about using the spell Quasimorph (OSE) creatively. Most recently I attended a masquerade ball as a lunar moth man/person. :)

[@JamesJoy-yc8vs]

That *is* a good band name! A friend of mine was in a band called Vicious Fishes. Would have made a great double-bill! 😎 Also, now I want to play an authentic moth-man. And flutter my mantle while I talk. Oh! And I'd waste spells casting Light just to stare at it!

[@BanditsKeep]

Love it

[@88Grabarz]

"That's a fighter" part is great. I'm looking for ways to simplify game rules and encourage player creativity and this here sounds like a ingienus way to do it.

[@BanditsKeep]

Thanks!

[@PrezHarrison]

Jackrum is ex soldier who moved to a small hamlet where he was the sole guard and a handy man for the village. After several years he helped train some locals to replace him as guards, he left with a group of younger adults many that he him self taught to become adventures. Now he has left them once he was sure they were prepared and now sets out on his own occasionally picking up strays and loners to teach and raise as he adventures.

[@BanditsKeep]

Nice!

[@PrezHarrison]

@@BanditsKeep thanks

[@Dreamfox-df6bg]

Two of my older characters I remember fondly: Awakened Dire Wolf Rogue/Shadowdancer that joined the group as a cub and grew to horse-size. I could have gone with the obvious barbarian, fighter or ranger considering the strength bonus he got with D&D3.5, but I thought it more fun of having something that big sneaking around. Not to mention the role-playing challenges. Also, in need he could carry several members of the group. But sometimes it just takes a different look at a class. Take the ranger, get a horse as an animal companion and go for the archer fighting style. Makes a good desert warrior as a background. Not optimal for dungeons, but the Ranger is still an ok melee fighter. And once you get some magic items for your horse...

[@BanditsKeep]

Nice. I love a sneaky wolf

[@RoDaGrier]

I kid you not, this maybe the most important video you have ever made. Empower players to let thier imagination run. That is what a DM should be doing!

[@BanditsKeep]

Thank You!

[@nottreal75]

I just wanted to thank you for putting the artist in the thumbnail. I can't tell you how many pieces I've enjoyed on this site that I have been left unable to seek out.

[@BanditsKeep]

I try to list them when I can

[@longshot9060]

Keep up the great videos! My current character in the AD&D game I play in with my son and our friends is a Gnoll Druid. He died and was reincarnated (via a scroll of reincarnation) as a goblin. Shortly afterward, he was transformed into a bugbear. A few adventures later he came across an NPC that was able to return him to his original Gnoll form (luckily I rolled under the character’s system shock test!).

[@BanditsKeep]

Nice!

[@Calebgoblin]

Nice video for the whole table, and also very encouraging and empowering thank you! A quick blurb of my character... It is a hulking warforged warlock in an Eberron setting, who was created as an experimental artificial intelligence to pilot the biggest airship ever (think Death Star). Its patron is a Machine-god from another dimension that was inadvertently tapped into when the warforged was created and now, unbeknownst to its creators, this AI is secretly a vessel for an alien agenda.

[@BanditsKeep]

Nice!

[@JayP-44]

Great video, Daniel! I have a 5e ranger, fey wanderer. My DM allowed me to borrow the lupin race from the mystara setting. He is a bit vain and wants nothing more than to fit into high society, despite his appearance. My fellow players rib me all the time about not wearing the best armor, meticulously cleaning my heirloom studded leather at every rest, and constantly protecting our healer, who I owe a life debt back from 1st level. So much fun!

[@BanditsKeep]

Awesome

[@commonweakness9060]

Amen brother! My family group has, over the years, removed many of the limiting rules and increased the creativity by playing less than optimal characters. It has made our game better than ever. Now my players really dive into their characters weaknesses. Keep up the good work and thanks.

[@BanditsKeep]

That’s awesome

[@YOOTOOBjase]

Foldira. Smallfolk/Dwarrow. Always barefoot. Uses earth magic that binds, or defends, or blinds targets. Has a cantrip where she stomps and a cloud of sand and grit whips up at close range.

[@BanditsKeep]

Nice!

[@BanditsKeep]

You have won! Send me an email banditskeep at gmail and I shall get the dice out to you

[@rob7953]

I had a fighter in AD&D 1e who was that chandelier-swinging buckler of swashes. He had an 18 DEX, wore chain mail instead of heavier armor, double-wielded a bastard sword and short sword (or two-handed the bastard sword in some situations) instead of carrying a shield, and was all-around annoying to other players who thought the character should be more optimized.

[@sleepinggiant4062]

The classes tell you the rules on how to resolve their abilities. Playing the character comes down to how your character behaves. I agree with not always taking a longsword because it does the most damage. I like to make my characters quirky. I always give them a phobia, delusion, disorder, or even a mania. I had a character that had mild case of tourettes and was always smelling things.

[@BanditsKeep]

That can be a fun way to explore the human condition

[@equality7_2522]

My cool character is a half demon bounty hunter called Lucian. His patron is the Spider Goddess of Hubris. He has spindly spiky horns adorning his blue black head. He has matching wavy brand marks on his upper arms from battling in the Ekrask arena at Slathereth.

[@BanditsKeep]

Nice

[@ukulekebaikey]

A character I'm currently playing that I'm excited about is named Caspian. He's currently a fighter, but the game is AD&D so I'm aiming for him to become a bard. I love that AD&D centers the bard around education, literature, and history. Caspian is a young man, born and raised in the starting village of our game, called Ashborough. Humble, if a bit naive, Caspian joined the village's militia because he felt a strong sense of loyalty to his people. Though he's fit and able-bodied, he's learning very quickly from his adventures that it takes a lot more than raw strength to be someone that others can depend on. His trainings during level-ups have not been focused on becoming a better fighter in combat, but a more well-rounded leader. He's been studying under a veteran captain from the militia, who's teaching him political theory, strategy, and rhetoric skills. He's also been learning about the village's dark colonial past from the current village elder, to know what mistakes to avoid. He's been organizing excursions to the local dungeon, with the help of independent adventurers, to bring wealth and prosperity back to his little village. As he levels up, I hope to see him eventually leave his little home of Ashborough to travel the world towards the Great City, where he can join a college, learn more of the cultures of people and the wider world, and begin his proper bard training.

[@BanditsKeep]

Very cool, I love the AD&D Bard

[@jeremydurdil556]

Great message here. Love it. I’ve been DMing for almost 40years and completely agree. All D&D is, is a simple structure to run a game. A basic construct that once combined with imagination was all we ever needed to play forever and in infinite variety. I think that appears to have been lost over the decades and editions. Still running BECMI because I never needed anything more than my imagination could provide.

[@BanditsKeep]

For sure

[@alanleckert1]

Axolin is a Deep Gnome which was swept away into the Feywild where he wandered with a crew of misfits for nearly 100 years. He ended up making a deal with the Unseelie Queen to return to the Material Plane, but she took away any abilities he had learned (making him lvl 1 Barbarian again). Axolin thought that he would never see his people again, but he doesn’t know it was only 3 years since he left, not 100 (I rolled a 1 on the Feywild time travel table). Finding odd jobs here and there, Axolin and his newly found group somehow ended up in Barovia (CoS campaign). What he is starting to realize is that the Unseelie Queen is slowly giving him abilities of her choosing, making him go down the Path of the Beast. He now has a tail and fangs, which has freaked out some of the other players.

[@BanditsKeep]

How does that beastly appearance go over in Barovia? I could see some fun play there

[@alanleckert1]

The players were a bit freaked out thinking it was vampirism or werwolf. I gave a hint at what was to come by talking about having an itch in my lower back and waking up with scratches on my face. Just hit level 3 so not much NPC roleplay yet. @@BanditsKeep

[@rudytrevizo7766]

Bungo Luckfoot, a Harengon fighter. He was found by a kindly old halfing couple and raised among halflings. He's a fast agile little guy who wants to be a hero but he got lost in the mists of Barovia and is just trying to help out where he can. Running him in a Curse of Strahd campaign.

[@BanditsKeep]

Nice

[@matthewheimbecker9055]

I made a character that I haven't used yet, but I'm excited about it. It's for the Symbaroum setting. He's a Changeling who was adopted by a wizard and grew up to become the wizard's bodyguard. He fights in a dueling fencing style, focused on defense. His background working with the wizard gives him some skill in alchemy and arcane knowledge, which I hope makes him an unusual fighter.

[@BanditsKeep]

Vey cool, haven’t played that system in years.

[@isaace8090]

Some of my favorite characters from back in the day were when we rolled 3d6 straight down the line and what we get is what we get. Then we picked our class and could pick from the 2E books. I picked from the Samurai kit from the fighter's handbook on one of these games as I had some decent rolls. This was with 2E rules mind you. My character backstory was he washed up on the shore after a shipwreck. He was part of an envoy to establish relations with a European type kingdom and they didn't make it. With no way home, he set off to see what the land was like. He had his katana, wakizashi, and armor with him and that was it. He didn't know the language which made interaction with the other PCs and NPCs fun. He would toss magic weapons away (grabbed up by the other PCs of course) in favor of his katana, that is until he found a suitable weapon. It was a magic spear that fit what he was used to from his home kingdom. I put him into every crazy situation I could and he survived them, somehow. He did some pretty impressive things with stats that were only great in strength and dex (15 and 16 respectively). He was the only PC to survive a battle because the spear allowed him to levitate. He levitated away when the battle was lost and waited until the witch they were fighting grew tired of waiting and left. He only did that because there was nobody alive to see his cowardice. Lots of crazy fun with that character.

[@BanditsKeep]

Sounds very fun to play

[@gusl3881]

Nice - In my experience what keeps games interesting is variety and interesting ideas on have to solve open ended problems. Both inventing those kinds of problems and responding to them as a character is a creative exercise and more it's one of the things that distinguishes RPGs from things like computer games. My longest running PC was an OD&D thief who started as a rat catcher and ended up as a leading figure in a rat cult.

[@BanditsKeep]

So true.

[@mediocremodeler5174]

Last Sunday my party of three was traveling from A to B and passing through three other towns on the way. I had nothing planned for those towns. So each time they got to a town I said “this town is unlike any other you’ve encountered, why is that X”? And had them give me a description and i riffed off of that and we ended up adding to the lore and adventure hooks. Was an opportunity for them to shape the world and all of us got to be creative.

[@BanditsKeep]

Nice!

[@QuickSilverMine]

Had a character for a friends campaign set in a Homebrew setting that spanned a massive cavern civilization. Her parents worked for the mageocracy and were forced to do more and more dangerous experiments in their home that eventually accidentally ended the life of my characters sister. My character later found a lovecraftian centipede monster she pacted with to spy on and learn more about the mageocracy and their experiments, and eventually take them down.

[@BanditsKeep]

Nice!

[@Slit518]

Archken Slaa'vuul was a Drow Oath of the Night Paladin, he is inflicted with vampirism. He is a part of his cult and lives in an underground city of vampires, mostly Drow but some other Races live there, too. He treats the vampirism like a religion, seeing it as the gift of eternal life, and offering it to those who wish to accept. He will still feed off of enemies, but he won't force anyone to be a vampire, well, except in a very rare case where a Doppelganger Assassin tried to take us out. He is also of the Nobility background so he can go in most places and people just feel like he is supposed to be there because he looks important enough. He uses a two-handed Maul, and for Spells he likes Illusion and Enchantment magic to trick or beguile is foes (or any obstacle he wishes to get by). He doesn't like to fight, but will if he has to.

[@BanditsKeep]

Cool

[@jeframdenkar]

My most noted character was St Wishbone, the Lord of Fools, the child of time, the celestial revolutionary, the redeemer of the lost, familiar of the Dragon goddess Prism, and god of heroes. Nearly 4 years of weekly play (during 3.x) and went from a level 1 bard to more then 120 effective character levels and rank 17 god neutral good god of space, time, travel, redemption, diplomacy, immortality, swordsmanship, and heroics. Noted for the fact his temples are all functional taverns and inns as well as being a familiar to a rank 20 Elder Dragon goddess of the wind and wave Prism.

[@BanditsKeep]

Very cool

[@winterhtech]

Probably the most interesting aspect of D20 Modern when it was released was moving away from classes as such and built a character out over levels based on the stat that's important, allowed you to spread out whatever you want. Interesting concept at least.

[@BanditsKeep]

Interesting

[@vincentcleaver1925]

Webs is an intelligent spider who spins tapestries and clothing for fun and profit. He's afraid of female spiders of his kind, spiders and females in general, lives in trees, has a huge appetite for obvious reasons. He attached himself to a small settlement with an inn and travelers but was recently driven out by a whisper campaign brought on by fear and bigotry. "I don't eat people!" For personal defense he has a bite and paralysing saliva, can set sticky entanglement traps, but isn't a web slinger. He makes slings and bolos, though. He's good at climbing, hiding and sneaking, fiahing and trapping, has learned a little about farming, cooking and brewing (loves meat pies and beer!). He speaks common and spider of course, can read and write the spider script that they weave or sort of paint into silks or flat surfaces webbing will adhere to and is learning the common script.

[@BanditsKeep]

Very interesting!

[@crallsfickle2994]

Neyanaat. Ratfolk. He was just a shifty rat who was a pretty brutal leader of his colony. It was eventually revealed that he was actually a collective of rats and his brutal leadership was largely (among a few other key reasons) due to his already being feared (the rats in the colony knew but the PCs didn’t). It was a fun reveal when the cloak dropped and dozens of rats swarmed the enemy.

[@BanditsKeep]

Fun

[@BanditsKeep]

I had a player do a similar thing (play a swarm) it was really fun

[@scottgarriott3592]

The Great Amazo, real name Thomas Highbottom. A halfling who grew up on a Romani-esq caravan. A magic user who was once con man and thief who stole a powerful magic user’s spell book. The magic user found out and came after him. He ran away from his family to protect them and now adventures with tough individuals to protect him. He is a coward who never uses harmful spells.

[@danielrowan4716]

Great back story / plot hook. It takes the halfling thief trope and really adds some wonderful depth and flavor. I like the role play potential on not casting damaging/ harmful spells.

[@BanditsKeep]

Fun

[@ericdry8850]

Demoulin the Dark, Human Necromancer. Born a noble, Demoulin showed promise as a magic user so he was sent off to learn the ways of magic. While he was away a plague came through his homeland and wiped out his family. Demoulin rushed back too late to help. He knew enough to raise his deceased pet dog, Ciric up as his familiar. He is now questing to find a cure from death.

[@BanditsKeep]

Nice!

[@peterhowardlawson]

Hi there. My current PC is an OSE druid multi-classed with Undead Hunter, a new class from a zine, Issue #13 of the d12 zine. Essentially he's a cultist of an odd druidic sect that prioritises ridding the world of those who have fallen outside the cycle of birth-death-rebirth into the state of undeath. He has a dog called Chomper and a constantly changing menagerie of Animal Friendshipped pals. He was recently very generously characterised as being "the heart of the group", which I think may mean "overly emotional and a bit daft".

[@BanditsKeep]

Nice

[@BakaPope]

Galatea "Gala" Wynrieth is a young woman raised in a monastery to forgotten gods sent out to recover religious artifacts, through that journey she makes friends of the elite military, specialists of the world's premier hunting guild, a family of experts of magical study, and wild woman skilled with hammer and javelin. They slew vampires, dragons, evil sorcerers, and gods but at the end of it all they always returned home to The Dawnstrider. Her friends and her journey were her power. Gala is a half-elf multiclass valor bard and divine soul sorcerer with the acolyte background. Which painted a more interesting picture?

[@BanditsKeep]

Nice! Are those other characters from players, or NPCs?

[@beardyben7848]

Fighters can be a blast! Totally EZ mode for creativity and background. First pick a weapon and fighting style. Then think of who they would be and where they would be from to end up learning that style and choosing that weapon. Combat is central to the function of the character in this game, so think of what they will and won't do in combat, and what they're likely and unlikely to do in combat. That's just about the right amount of background. Not too much for the GM to read, or so little they are boring, just enough if you want to lean into role playing.

[@MADGator]

The beauty of fighters is that they can be easy, but they have a huge potential for depth if you want to dig in. Why, beyond the immediate need for survival, do they fight? Is there anyone or anything beyond themself that they fight for? Do they enjoy combat or engage only reluctantly? Are their fighting techniques common and respected in their culture, or is the opposite true? Fighters function well mechanically whether your characterization stays in the shallows or you dive into the deep end!

[@BanditsKeep]

For sure

[@jameshartley6315]

I just recently found your channel. You make great content. Thanks for all the hard work. We are playing in the way rld of midgard. Jorric Far-runner was adopted by stone giants. He is quite literally a rock chucker. He was imbued with a magic power (He thinks its his bag) To change small stone into giant boulders as he hits something with them. He struggles against the wishes of the God Boreas. He traveled to the plains of Khazzak where he made a name for himself in the black city. Then he stolle the heart of the wrong centaur and is now running for his life. He is essentially Conan.

[@BanditsKeep]

Awesome!

[@freddaniel5099]

Great advice as usual! Gaming the rule system is, I suppose, also a form of creativity. It's not the same form of creative thinking as what you discuss in this video, however. Blayse is a mage who bears the scars of having been badly burned. Blayse flavors magic spells cast with images, odors, heat and sounds, all of flame. Blayse speaks to fire, whether it's a candle flame or campfire, as if it's a sentient being. Conversely, Blayse demonstrates a disinterest in water, drinks sparingly and never bathes. Cheers!

[@BanditsKeep]

Nice!

[@onealflynn2414]

My solo Basic Fantasy character Monster Hunter V. Was found on the steps of a church as an infant. Raised by a Cleric named Father Aaron and trained in the Order of Light. Hunting monsters that lurk in the darkness.

[@BanditsKeep]

Awesome!

[@tomatotomato9813]

So true, very kool video! My favorite PC in an ongoing campaign: Yaya/Saraya, a cheerful barmaid Halfelf turned nudist pugilist. She became Saraya after an obscene ritual where she merged with a drow duchess called Saribel and believes to be the chosen representative of a Januslike goddess (merged Yin Yang Creator goddesses). Shes an accomplished criminal /businesswoman having founded a Fight Club kinda organization M.I.G.H.T. (Men in Green Hemp Tights), infiltrated the City Watch as a counselor, has her own event location/bordello called Dopplegangbangers, sells wargames and collectibles via Westwood Studios and her new business idea is Burger-Baduk (Go game with miniburgers instead of black and white stones).

[@BanditsKeep]

Fun!

[@jasonconnerley]

I think you nailed the problem, people just need to trust their friends to accept them and the way they want to play.

[@BanditsKeep]

For sure

[@captainbloth]

Anton Lalna was a poor young man who joined the adventuring party as a burglar/thief because he and his family had nothing to eat. In addition, his family was in massive debt to a local gang of loan sharks. But he was a coward, so adventuring was not his forte. He did his best, but he was just not made for danger. Anton usually hung out in the back while the party did most of the dirty work. Once he earned his few gems and gold, he left the party and gambled away his loot in a few weeks instead of feeding his family and paying the loan sharks. And that was Anton's goal, to get some money to help his family out, but his vices were hard to resist. This character was a part of a grim-dark campaign I was a part of. I wanted to play a "regular" guy fitting for the setting, and it was super fun for a change. Later, I discovered that when playing "normal" people, their heroic deeds weigh a lot more, and the satisfaction is more significant. The reason I am sharing this character is not because he was super cool or had a crazy backstory but because I learned a lot from him as a Player and a Game Master.

[@BanditsKeep]

Thanks for sharing, I agree with the sentiment completely

[@VitoWolf-me3tq]

My cool character is a young boy ( looks 13 ish but is really 103) covered in wild magic tattoos . That lives with goblins

[@dennisthornton4434]

Sounds fun

[@danielrowan4716]

I love the idea of magic tattoos.

[@BanditsKeep]

Nice!

[@davidlogan7709]

My favorite character to play is Sweetmeat the goblin wizard in the 5e campaign my roommate is running set in OldSchool Runescape. He was kicked out of the Goblin village for being too runty and turning to his brains rather than his (nonexistent) brawn. A weird balance of goblin gross and an insatiable curiosity and delight in books and learning, because knowledge = power. In the future I may try running a Swarmkeeper ranger who keeps fireflies, moths or butterflies because they're beautiful. I've been blessed with a great playgroup of guys from church who don't take things too seriously and are good friends to boot.

[@BanditsKeep]

Sounds awesome

[@VexxarAlHara]

Hildeon Beltein, was a 94 year old human who was a legendary warrior on his homeland. Throughout his entire life he fought and adventure to protect his homeland, and even fought in several wars against demons. His last battle was yet another demonic invasion to his city. He said he wouldn't die until he killed the Demon Lord who was the responsible for all those attacks launched over the years. And he did just that. He fought against several monsters, and killed the Demon Lord, dying shortly after to his wounds. Happy and accomplished.... Until he woke up. He thought he was in the afterlife, but quickly got confused when he saw his reflection at a nearby lake. He looked like a scary giant metal construct, with fiery eyes. Somehow his soul ended up in an empty Warforged body. He happily accepted that his time wasn't over, and decided to keep on adventuring, and trying to learn why he's a Warforged now. The funny bit is that he's that giant robot-like metal creature with the voice of a very old man, and cool grandpa personality.

[@danielrowan4716]

Nice twist on the Revenant story.

[@BanditsKeep]

Fun

[@Dyundu]

Locke Maur, Elf Thief. The system we were using was loosey-goosey with alignment restrictions (as in, no restrictions), so I wanted to see what a lawful good rogue-style character would look and feel like. Locke was an entrepreneur, seeking out riches and fame as an adventurer in order to raise enough capital and social clout to start a franchise of adventurers’ guilds across the multiverse. His backhanded ways of dealing damage in combat were rationalized as putting himself at risk in a fight was bad for business, and his opening move in all encounters with hostile sapient humanoids was “How much are they paying you?” If he could hire them, then a) combat resolved, no resources wasted, and b) he could engage in anticipatory socialization activities to onboard these new staff members, potentially with an eye towards future management. He died in the basement of a building used as a cult hideout (they had no interest in alternative employment), but was brought back by the party’s druid via a reincarnation spell after they placed his corpse at the recently closed gate to the Nine Hells. And of course the dice roll dictated that his reincarnated form was that of a Tiefling.

[@BanditsKeep]

That’s great!

[@MADGator]

My current character, Harlan, is a Paladin/Hexblade who "solves" the problem of divided loyalties between god and patron: as far as he knows, there is no division! The god he worships almost never speaks directly to anyone, even clerics, and basically sends an angel as a messenger. When Harlan prayed to him for more power, though, he got a direct answer. In his mind, he is the chosen one, and others in his religion are either unworthy or hiding something.

[@BanditsKeep]

Cool

[@MADGator]

@BanditsKeep Thanks! I play with a group that tends to make characters that are interesting but fairly straightforward... then play them as eccentrics. My characters somehow end up as the reasonable/ sensible one in the party, so I like to make them stand out somehow in an attention-grabbing way. My first campaign character with this group was a military veteran fighter. Pretty simple, but he was the only one to have been born far away in another country inspired by fantasy Greece. So, I gave him a strong Southern (U.S.) accent! Who says accents are the same in other universes?

[@mikaelquites4834]

Thanks a lot for the video, Daniel! A character I've created is a metallic elf bounty hunter with a guilty consciousness and looking for ancestral treasures of his family.

[@BanditsKeep]

Cool.

[@jamesalexander9468]

Back in the later 80s in high school I played some AD&D 1e with friends during lunch. they played their fave characters with every method they could think of to max out their abilities. I picked a half ogre character fighter / cleric character. I didn't create the class I found it in an issue of best of dragon. But it was 1 of my most creative choices. Besides nobody picks a fight with an 8 foot tall character especially when he's the only healer in the party.

[@BanditsKeep]

Nice

[@matthall7975]

1 armed beggar who freezes in moments of danger but is also seemingly lucky or charmed and fate seems to always bend towards his survival

[@BanditsKeep]

Excellent

[@pprunty5809]

A commoner whose body was magically switched (Freaky Fridayed) with the most reknowed swordsman in the land.

[@BanditsKeep]

Nice!

[@Akinohotarubi]

Over the course of a year your channel became my favorite D&D channel, and this is -I think- my favorite video of yours. I've yet to find players that look at thing this way though, heh... But looking back at those older editions really made me understand why I haven't been able to enjoy a game for years. If I could spend the rest of RPG gaming days without ever hearing the words "character build" ever again that would be great. Now, for the cool character I'm actually going to mention one of my players' character, since every iteration of me trying wrap my head around builds have ruined character creation for me when I sit on the other side of the screen : a Dhampir with a cursed heirloom weapon that sucks souls -which is actually a prison for an ancient blasphemous being from before the time of mankind (this part is mine as the DM in this game)-, he was found by a Paladin of the Morning Lord during a punitive expedition against the local vampire lord. He was then raised as a roguish inquisitor of Lathander. He tries to hide his origins as well as understanding them (basically no one knows what a dhampir is in this world) and is very concerned about the fact that his "brother", a true vampire from his father bloodline, will someday try to get revenge on him (which obviously happened, as a DM you can't let that kind of backstory unused right?). If anything, that character got me to read most of Elric books for inspiration.

[@BanditsKeep]

Super fun!

[@stormmerm4776]

Weissbergauzen Vanbauer is a way-too-young-for-his-own-good woodcarver that carves bombs in the shape of fat cats. He really does think he makes them explode through some alchemical process, but in reality he enchants them and he is entirely oblivious to it.

[@BanditsKeep]

Fun

[@finnfish5418]

Elvithar of Fallowmere. Fighter/Mage. A half elf with a short fuse who dedicates his life to hunting Monsters and Dark Wizards before their evil corrupts any further.

[@BanditsKeep]

Nice

[@benjaminholcomb9478]

My craziest character is a Kobold named sticky who builds and fights exclusively with Sticks. (I realize the point of this video isn't mechanical prowess, but he accidentally is way more powerful than he has any right to be. I guess I had my cake and ate it too lol.)

[@BanditsKeep]

Nice!

[@keithallendennis]

Pulver-Kash Ryllstak, a barking mad Derro Circle of the Weald Druid with a Prophet background. The race, class, background and even the awesome name all come from Kobold Press (big, big fan here). He's been driven from the depths up to the bright, noisy surface world with a warning: The horrors of the Void, and it's servants, are coming. Coming for everything that lives, coming for everything that is...

[@BanditsKeep]

Very cool

[@christopherfaenger4141]

I used to think of character class as a container that has in it everything the character could be. Now I think of it as a core structure that we can add things onto as we go.

[@BanditsKeep]

I like that

[@zensuufu]

Taqui: An old medicine man sort of witch doctor. He is spends time meditating and pursuing psychoactive substances. He tries his best to save anyone he can, but will not hesitate to put down a hostile encounter. Because of the current events of the campaign he is currently questioning the limits of his good nature.

[@BanditsKeep]

Cool

[@CaptCook999]

Back when all we had was original D&D and the Basic Set, we had to be creative when making our characters. There were no rules for secondary skills. No rules for backgrounds for characters. You just had to make something up. If you wanted a Thief Acrobat you just made them a circus performer. If you wanted a Barbarian, you might describe your tribe to get certain abilities. You might make a Fighter and just say that he was a Hunter. And you would know how to track animals and judge what creature the tracks are from. Creativity was a staple of the game.

[@BanditsKeep]

For sure

[@bhorrthunderhoof4925]

Thanks for reminding the younger players what TTRPGs are all about. Only our imagination is the limit! And let's create together damn good stories. Cheers

[@BanditsKeep]

Indeed

[@elreverend3277]

I like the sentiment of this video. It has to be fun to play! Long ago I made a character that didn't fit into the system (Dark Eye) by default but my group let me do it anyway. Thinking back this was generous as I had my cake and could it eat too. I wouldn't make this character today, but it worked back then - with lots of creative interpretation. Getting 'the ole group' back together is difficult since were spread across the globe these days...

[@BanditsKeep]

It’s awesome your friends were open to your ideas

[@miksmeistergeneral]

I had a monk character who, although not really interesting in overall concept, helps illustrate how GMs and players can work together to 'stretch' core rules. I wanted a way to incorporate parries and disarms into the game when using weapons like sai or tonfa. And we were able to tweak the rules (through a few iterations) in a way that spiced up combat and gave the character an incentive to not always use unarmed strikes.

[@BanditsKeep]

Very cool!

[@elowaywhite477]

Elxi came back from death’s door to continue her career as a ghost slayer blood hunter. She fell through a portal in Sigil and landed on cluster of sky city districts falling to the surface after the fourth moon sundered the city core. Once one of my players feels comfortable enough to jump behind the screen I’ll finally get to play her.

[@BanditsKeep]

Nice

[@Arnkel]

A Bard who is a prodigy musician attempting to bring the music she hears in her head to life. Every time she does, it creates new magic. She believes the music isnt really in her head, and has been expelled from the bardic college bc of her desire to seek the source of the song.

[@BanditsKeep]

Cool

[@themrp4424]

Really dig the thought behind this video. Sometimes it feels that player's choices during a game are coming from a pull down menu of things they saw others say is the optimized way to play or build a class on reddit or youtube and I would love to see players have a stronger of idea of who they want the character to be and build and play based on that and the way the game plays out rather than some preordained idea of what is the optimized way to play/build a character so they can "win" whatever that means.

[@BanditsKeep]

For sure

[@VioletDeliriums]

i watch your videos a lot and i love them. i like that they are (1) positive and focused on improving things rather than complaining about them, (2) are not hyped-up with stupid graphics and sounds and overproduction, (3) build people up instead of judging them...plus i like BX and BX-rooted games (like Dolmenwood is my current fav) a lot! it is a game that allows people to be creative as DMs, players and as a complete group!!!! :D

[@BanditsKeep]

Thanks! I had some fun running in the original Dolmenwood zines.

[@Barthenn]

Aynur is a Sylph (Half-Djinn (Djinn are Air Genie)) and Half-Elf, and a Dhampir from the Moroi Bloodline. She is a Champion (Paladin with Chaotic Good alignment) with the Liberator Cause and a Tempest Oracle of Ranginori. For the past few months, she has been having recurring dreams in which she hears thunder in the distance. This is because her Deity, Ranginori, has recently escape its prison. Fleeing her past and a crime she committed, Aynur found herself in a small outpost in Ustalav (where our game started). She currently uses a hood to hide her hair, so as not to attract too much attention to the weirdness of her heritage (Sylph hair floats in the hair like pushed upward by a wind) She also has blue-cyan marking across her skin that pulses a dim blue light. She has an athletic body and an attractive face, which are common for half-elves. Her eyes may be a bit disturbing 2 small black dot pupils and milky white iris, and ashen white skin and hair. She is a combat medic and was a Shield maiden before adventuring. She loves to sing, which she often did while resting around campfires during their missions, to cheer up people during hard times or bring the mood up. She sees the good in people and while she doesn't specifically follow the law to the letter she has a strong sense of right and wrong, and tries to believe that action speaks louder than words and so she attempts to lead by example. She is courageous, if maybe a bit reckless, when it comes to saving people. She would gladly give her life to protect another. One day she hopes to be reunited with her mother. Until then she has found a group of adventurers, at first she was secretive about her life and still is, but she is slowly opening up to them. I commissioned an Art for her, if you google Aynur and Pathfinder. She has a very dark backstory.

[@BanditsKeep]

Nice!

[@smarmydude3019]

It's well past the point, but posting for fun: Orellanine is the heir to a powerful fey family, who have domain over mushrooms and all other things that thrive off of the natural decay of the world. She flees her family, however, overwhelmed by the pressure of her responsibilities. She becomes a sort of rogue, taking from the rich and giving to the poor like a fungal Robin Hood - but her mycelial magic also allows her to do the same with lifeforce itself, leeching health and nutrients from her foes and using it to bolster her allies, or dump it into them to restore their wounds and stamina. She feels guilty in taking for herself, however, and her guilt translates to her abilities, leaving herself quite vulnerable in combat; she more than makes up for that by surrounding herself with powerful fungal-enhanced allies, however.

[@BanditsKeep]

Nice!

[@markmclaughlin4244]

I am our groups dm now but my last character was Orin Timberfield a young Druid send out to find the mystical components to maintain the shroud that conceals his forest village. The outside world is foreign to him, economy, religions, customs, morals and relies heavily on his adventuring party to navigate this new land.

[@BanditsKeep]

Awesome

[@zeugenberg]

Video starts: that's one CRISP focus! Okay... will listen to the content now :-D

[@BanditsKeep]

😊

[@kaifuller3535]

One of the best RPG videos in awhile. Good stuff.

[@BanditsKeep]

Thank You!

[@DaxterL]

This is such a hurdle to get over, but i'm glad i'm partially at it. It's definitely also all about communication, "hey dm i wanna do this" and work with the dm. I learn that i just love edgy stuff, very gothic, tragic stuff, gorey stuff, all that, and i just embrace it. I even went as far as making a shadar-kai hex-blade that quotes William Blake as often as possible, i even got a collection of his poems for that and... it was an interesting challenge to actually find a poem or part of a poem that fits XD it was fun. Tweaking abilities and homebrewing some stuff to fit a theme more properly? Hell yeah, wisdom casting warlock was a fun one. But also my little homebrew class that my table even helped me balance out and even extract some more mechanical fun stuff out of (works kind of like the summoner in pathfinder 2e). And i used that one a lot and they were one of my most played characters, at least the campaign survived more with them. And completely reflavouring a class to use the abilities that fit an idea of a character i had outside of the dnd mechanic? Oh man, my most recent and such a fun character i can't wait to play again. So if you're curious let me indulge myself. Goes by Ogen, he appears as a tall but thin man, dressed in ragged black clothes that has seen better days, black hair and a dirty 5 o' clock shadow, appears human enough save for his off-putting choice of colour and hobo style look to him, but the thing that stands out are his nearly glowing amethyst eyes. At distance he looks like trouble, always has his head buried in his dark leather bound tome. But if you talk to him, he's quite a chill guy, just not much of a speaker, he likes to smile when talking to someone and talks in a slow deliberate manner if not slightly slurred. His care-free nature does come to an extreme with his philosophy of "All's well that ends well". He hunts down undead, inteligent undead specifically, but instead of killing them, he is there to help them pass into the next world, as an exorcist of sorts, but instead of "THE POWER OF CHRIST COMPELS YOU!" it's more of "hey, it's ok, i'm here for you, you've been here far too long, and you need to rest now." He is a hellhound, a homebrew race of mine, not like a hellhound you'd think of in dnd. Hellhound inspired by the folk legends that describe hellhounds as guardians of the underworld, protectors of cemeteries. But mechanically it's just a glorified shifter, but instead of just turning into a furry, he takes on a black misty form that resembles of a wolf (yes with a tail) gains darkvision (because i love it when darkvision is not just free candy given out), and ignored non-magical difficult terrain for an hour, then long-rest before he can use that form again. He summons either a hellhound or a raven, shaped out from ashen raven feathers, and most of his other abilities are flavoured around throwing raven feathers or ashes. And since we like to practice not saying what our class is, the group was quite surprise to learn that mechanically i'm playing a druid. When it comes to background, he grew up in a literal ghosttown, a village full of empty houses and untended crops, except for all the ghosts living there, they're all chill though, and being a hellhound it was his duty to protect them and their possesions that they could not protect themselves. These posessions are anchors for the ghosts to hold on to. It's like a home for the elderly, just dead, and he cared for them, until their soul was ready to actually depart. So TL;DR, a goth-looking therapist for the undead.

[@BanditsKeep]

Very cool!

[@kingomnicide698]

Agreed 100% on all points. Fantastic video!

[@BanditsKeep]

Thank You!

[@dmxoan]

My first character ever was in AD&D 2nd edition in 1989, I played a Dwarf Fighter that specialized in Daggers and Gladiator Fighting named Zon Quickstep, he was strong with an 18/72 Stremgth and a 15 Dex, but he was not smart or good with the ladies.

[@BanditsKeep]

Sounds fun!

[@CrossroadsMystic]

I took the meme of a Lizardmen raised by squirrels and run with it. He was a Swarmkeeper Ranger.

[@BanditsKeep]

Nice

[@darenthegraysage9003]

Halfling Arcane Trickster/Skulker Feat. Birth Place: Waterdeep, near the dockward He has a brother, Flake who’s his brains for most of his heist and setting up contracts. His friends own the Boar & Wench and that’s where they fence, art objects to patrons. His parents live in Womwood and they farm, but they never invite the children to come home. So they send gold (in unsold art) each month home to stockpile in their barn. He’s a rogue because he goes into homes posing as an exterminator, then he sets up the home to break in later to steal art, often using sewers to escape He wants to join a thieves guild but knows it’s a solo life and he would have to give up his relationship with his brother He was offered to join once but turned it down He’s looking to join a new group because the guards raided the Boar and Wench and now he needs a new place to sell his stolen loot and more loot because they confiscated about 3 years of gigs

[@BanditsKeep]

Sounds like some fun adventuring

[@brodyhawkins3158]

The character I'm currently using as the primary character in my solo party, as well as a prominent NPC is the game I run on Saturdays is named Aenwyn Dorlanisti. She's the daughter of an elven king who was essentially ignored because she was born with purple/blue skin spotted with dimly glowing white dots like stars. She's a sorceress who has training with swords, and she left home to find a better life, but soon found herself inexplicably drawn to odd people and places. She wears a black gown and veil at all times to leave no skin showing. Her race is starfolk, which are incredibly rare and the subject of many myths and legends, so she prefers to avoid the attention. She's the true leader of an adventuring party known as The SIlvered Swords, but her friend Bronn acts as the figurehead to help her maintain a low profile. I use the starfolk race in most of the games/settings I play in. The idea is that they're essentially the essence of the universe stilled into a being. They can be born into any race or culture, and are astronomically (ha ha) rare. They experience overwhelming urges to do things, visit places, or speak to certain people. That's caused by the universe (which is a semi-sentient being in my games) channeling intention into them and using them as the purest vessels of itself. It's basically free plot motivation for any starfolk characters.

[@BanditsKeep]

I like that! So the starfolk part is narrative and you use the standard rules for race and class in play?

[@krinkrin5982]

I've had a dwarf fighter in one game. His backstory was that he has fallen in love with a girl and so he is adventuring to get enough gold to pay her dowry. The other players loved this idea.

[@Xplora213]

Very simple, but extremely powerful motivation to drive the story forward. Sometimes you need to keep it simple to allow the story to evolve easier. No joke. I’m stealing this lo😂

[@BanditsKeep]

That’s great!

[@deeps2761]

I had a Dwarven fighter called Dalin Kinema because it was an anagram of the girl I fancied name. That makes me feel old, it was just shy of 40 years ago..... 😮If you're trying to figure it out, the first name is easy, the second name is an obscure Scottish surname, I've not met another, that Dalin sounds Tolkienish is coincidental as I hadn't read it at the time.

[@jerry247]

Elf that finds comfort in dwarven trade.

[@BanditsKeep]

Cool

[@kendiamond7852]

I love these ideas. I love not standing in the way of creativity but I can see problems developing from modifying characters around the table. The problem usually will arise around the table. It'll come in the form of one character getting more power or attention than another one. It might take a delicate balance to off set this from happening.

[@BanditsKeep]

Sure and an understanding from players that if the character is unbalanced or doesn’t fit they should adjust so everyone can have fun.

[@scottmarsh2991]

A 10th-Level Cleric with only 10 in Religion? That’s my best 5e character ever! To hell with “builds.”

[@BanditsKeep]

Nice!

[@gnome_de_guerre]

Doing awesome stuff is Winning!

[@BanditsKeep]

Thank You!

[@TheYuanti]

My Cleric Fortunus: He, a zealous priest Conviction made him a beast Villain he became

[@BanditsKeep]

Interesting