What is the least powerful PC you have had fun with?

[Particle_Man]

I mean yeah Tier 1s are the most powerful and all, but not everyone plays them, meaning there must be something other than power to the game.

So what have you have a lot of fun playing that is the least powerful character?

Note, I don't mean "this character would normally be not-powerful but I optimized the crap out of it to make it powerful". I mean "this character is honestly not that powerful but it is so fun I don't care."

[Coidzor]

A low-op, Low-level Dwarven Cleric. He was weaker and played weaker than any of my other characters, probably mostly because of his level and the fact that he was my first character that I got to actually play.

[OracleofSilence]

Probably an Straight fighter, einhander fighting styles, with spring attack, whirlwind attack, EWP Bastard Sword.

Just played a standard swashbuckler style character, would leap around the battlefield an smack people, and then jump away. He was hilariously fun to play cause the DM would contantly be forced to attempt to out maneuver him. His role in he party ws to be as distracting as possible, and to not die. Every one else just blew the crap out of the enemies with summons and touch attacks. (the party was Fighter 7th (me), Druid 7th (shapeshifter variant), and Sorcerer 6th/Mindbender 1st. And i still never felt useless cause i had a role they could not replicate no matter ho hard the tried.

[eggs]

I want to say an Aristocrat or Expert.

But truth be told, they've all been way better optimized than some of the first characters I played in 3e. Either a Half-Elf "generalist" Fighter or an inept Bladesinger attempt probably would have been my *worst* character, but I had a blast with both of them.

Basically, I don't think I've ever not had fun due to optimization - high or low. The bad games I've played have been bad for other reasons.

[King Atticus]

If we're talking least powerful in terms of combat it's the character I'm playing right now. It's a factotum build (going into mindbender/exemplar) that specifically designed for non-combat situations. My whole combat goal is to stay out of the way and survive at all costs (although if he needed to he could UMD the heck out of some scrolls but that's a last resort). But I don't think I've failed a skill check all game (at least not one that mattered) and am having a blast RP-ing him. He is the weakest combat build I've ever made but my favorite character ever.

[Eldariel]

I have fun with anything I play. I just have more fun when mechanics match the concept. I had a ton of fun with my first 3.X character: Tamariel Amakiir. He was an Elven Warrior Mage (Two-Weapon Fighter/Archer with the build of Fighter 6/Wizard 1/Arcane Archer). Well, I had plenty of fun until we got to the mid levels and I noticed that the only way I could improve anything is to sink more gold into it. And when I realized how much more like I envisioned him he could've been if I made him into a Ranger; bloody lack of Spot/Listen/skillpoints.

For a master warrior-type character, being as strong as my weapon just didn't work; and I also ran out of feats to keep up with both combat styles so I had to give up stuff on both fronts. But the first ~7 levels were very enjoyable, so I can honestly say I had fun with him.

[pwykersotz]

Probably my healbot Favored Soul. He was a blacksmith as well. Entirely focused on those two elements, woefully sub-optimal. Still, with my party of a Chaotic Barbarian and a Chaotic Fighter, we had a blast mowing through enemies with me crafting magical gear for them and keeping them patched up mid-battle.

[Shadowknight12]

Half-Celestial wizard/rogue/daggerspell mage. It was my first PC. It was a glorious mess that couldn't do ANYTHING right. I loved the bastard.

[Mystify]

half elf diplomat. The biggest contribution he has to combat is granting everyone 1 DR. Other than that, he can around and scratch people if he gets lucky. Funnily enough, he would be functional at combat given a few more levels, as I would turn his charisma into a weapon. However, he is fun for the social aspects.

[Hirax]

My very first character, which was a monk with a con of 6, and other quite middling stats. I recall dodge and iron will being on my list of feats.

[Ravens_cry]

An attempt at multi-classing a rogue and a cleric. MAD and unsatisfactory at either, but highly enjoyable drunken lout who loved to bring joy to others.

[Need_A_Life]

Dwarven Monk/Inquisitor in Pathfinder. A drunk who frequently risked his life for everyone else and still, somehow, the longest-lived character in that campaign. He had the utmost respect for paladins, though had been refused to be one, because he didn't have the right "attitude" (Charisma of 6).

Halfling Vow of Poverty Warlock in 3.5. While I was ridiculously stealthy, I couldn't keep up with the heavily optimized characters in a level 18+ game.

[Midnight_v]

Sunaj Van Vleet. Fighter2/Rogue3... it was before I knew anything about how the game worked so we were just chunking some dice around not knowing how weak we really were, but the Dm didn't know what he was doing either so a lot of it was Magical Tea Party, and it was fun till we realized the only reason we were alive was commmunal ignorance.

[sol_kanar]

A fighter, devoted to Kelemvor, that got attacked by a Ghost when he was a kid and was now a fiery opponent of the undead. He had a lot of "flavorful" feats: Ghost Scarred, several others anti-undead things, and one that gave him Knowledge (religion) as a class skill.

He was originally from the Forgotten Realms settings, but got transported into Ravenloft. Against anything except undead, he was a low-op fighter, with a two-handed sword and full armor...and even against undead opponents, he was much less effective than a Cleric. No Sunder, no Trip, no reach weapon. If I remember correctly, he had Power Attack, though.

Still, I had a lot of fun with him, because:

a) He was the only "tank" (quotes intended) in the party.

b) The rest of the PCs were more or less as optimized as him.

c) In Ravenloft, half of the monsters we faced were undead, so he had a lot of chances to "shine" :-)

[Aharon]

Probably my current character. Druid 3 with lots of house rules. He currently has four spells: detect magic, cure minor wounds, cure light wounds and summon nature's ally II.

I had less powerful characters when I started 3e, but playing those wasn't fun :smallbiggrin:

[prufock]

Half-Ogre grapple- and trip-focused Monk/Fighter at ECL 8-9. Not optimal at all, but it was fun, especially with a custom ring of Enlarge Monster.

[Das Platyvark]

My current Pathfinder character. Paladin 3. Has his own (skewed) ideals about religion. I basically try and play him like the Batman, and tend to either be awesome or get my ass handed to me, with equal regularity.

[Jerthanis]

Either it was Toma Levine, who I customhacked together as my first real 3.0 character as what I saw as being halfway between a fighter and a rogue. A Treasure Hunter, giving up Sneak Attack entirely but getting 6 skillpoints per level, full base attack, half the fighter bonus feats, and I fought with a rapier with weapon finesse while in light armor.

Or it was Jerthanis, my online namesake... a Rogue 3/Wizard 5 by the end who took nothing but spells to supplement Rogue abilities, like Invisibility, Spider Climb, True Strike (to get hits in with my Crossbow... this was seriously my contribution to fights), and other similar spells. At level 7 (Rogue 3/Wizard 4) I got cornered by a level 1 warrior in chainmail with a longsword and shield and crawled away from that fight in single digit HP.

Both these characters have some of my favorite moments of RPing.

[FearlessGnome]

My first character was a Paladin. It was great. :smallbiggrin:

I'm really enjoying the Sorc//Druid14 I'm playing at the moment, too, but a low-op paladin was a good class for easing me into the game. And destroying all the expensive poisons we found instead of letting the party sell them was hilarious. It was the first loot we got 2 or 3 levels. :smallbiggrin:

[Zaq]

I had some fun with an Incarnate for a while. Incarnates aren't weak, but he didn't really ever end up carving out a proper niche in the group. I did eventually retire him because I felt like I wasn't contributing as much as I should have, so he might not count.

Then of course there's the whole Truenamer thing.

[Urpriest]

Norebo Jasadin. Warlock 1 with See the Unseen, Point-Blank Shot and Precise Shot. A naive young soul with the tendency to say "pew-pew!" when shooting his eldritch blast. Very comfortable with the dead though due to his pact with a big powerful ghost and being raised by clerics of Wee Jas. Rather surprised the other characters when the cheery, childish warlock started walking around closing the goblin corpses' eyes after the battle.

[Autopsibiofeeder]

That must have been a bard. No, wait for it, they are fairly powerful when built right, but that is where the problem was. This was back in 2nd edition, and he got later converted to 3.0. So, it was a rogue with a special wizard-package tacked onto it with a strong desire to be able to wield a sword and I figured added coolness would come from two-weapon fighting. 'Twas my first character, so hey. Anywho, while in 3.5 the concept could work in a way, in 3.0 and especially 2nd edition, this was a near-impossible thing to pull off.

Basically, he acted as a squire to the party paladin / leader and as 'face'. Always in the front, were it social or combat, and always on the border of failing. My creativity as a player (if I may say so myself) in general got my out of most situations (albeit at the expense of hilarity). Ever since that time, many many years ago I have been of the opinion that bards are one of the most fun, if not the most fun class to play.

[BobVosh]

Hmm. Pixie rogue. I could do almost nothing in combat, so much fun to play.

[Particle_Man]

That must have been a bard. No, wait for it, they are fairly powerful when built right, but that is where the problem was. This was back in 2nd edition, and he got later converted to 3.0. So, it was a rogue with a special wizard-package tacked onto it with a strong desire to be able to wield a sword and I figured added coolness would come from two-weapon fighting.

:elan: Doesn't that seem needlessly complicated?

:nale: Well, now it does, yeah!

Just kidding! Glad that you loved the character.

[That_guy_there]

Mine would be a Soulblade/ Pyrokenitc set in modern day. He's running around with a ranger, bard, and psion. We are not a high powered group in that game. Part of the fun of it is in this world there are no guns but there is magic... which has seen us pitted agains dragons, animated breath weapons and weretiger sorcerers.

My character is literally touched by madness, so he sees things that don't exist, hears "gods" talking and syas things no one else really gets. And somehow he became the leader of this group. Through no trickery or deception or even bullying they others elected him leader. So i get to come up with all these crazy scemes and plans and they sorta go along with it.

Thats totally worth the fact that Soulknife falls on the low end of the tiers...
:smallbiggrin:

[Mystify]

Hmm. Pixie rogue. I could do almost nothing in combat, so much fun to play.
You must have been doing something wrong....

[Azoth]

One of my most fun was my first character. A human monk/rogue mutli class. He had the uncanny knack for making opponent roll 1's when he would sneak attack with stunning fists anyother time I barely managed to hit anything but he was a blast for the fear he put in people by uttering the phrase "Hey! What the hell is that over there?!"

Another is one I turned into an NPC for most of my champaigns. An Elf Druid that was constantly drunk/hungover, rather stoic...unless an orc/half-orc was in sight or mentioned. Then he would instantly use wall of stone to make a thunder dome and go full power attacking with his falchion. He also had a habbit of prepairing alot of cure spells to keep himself standing. He was the kind of anti-orc racist that would entangle the party and try to solo entire tribes. Surprisingly, he was the longest lived member of his party...and became known as the bane of all orcs in the kingdom. He also tended to be mean spirited with spells...like flame striking people that set the woods on fire or lightning bolting people pissing into rivers or using obscuring mist on children playing in "his" woods.

[WildPyre]

I had fun with a straight sword and board fighter using a bastard sword. He started off as a very bored town guard before he was forced by his father to join the adventurers, all of whom were casters of one type or another.

He was never happy... ever, no matter what. He was certain he was going to die horrible and painfully, and absolutely detested the life of an adventurer. We always joked that he was going to end up in a PRC called "Miserable Bastard" that kept him from dying just to prolong his misery.

That guy was awesome.

[The Glyphstone]

The Commoner 1 I played in an all-Commoner game. He actually managed to roll Wis 13 and I think Charisma 12, so he would have eventually retrained into Paladin if the game hadn't folded during the first combat encounter against a couple of goblins.

[XionUnborn01]

The most fun I ever had was playing an Ogre half copper dragon fighter, from level 14-32. His LA was so huge, but I had so much fun playing him because he got a kingdom from the deck of many things. three times. He went from a warrior with nothing to lose to being a 'diplomat' who's best negotiation skill was threatening to feed the other person to his pet t-rex.