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killer_monk
2013-02-22, 11:30 AM
So I'd like to ask all of you who&what your all-time favorite character was. What edition were they from? what made them so fun to play? and what is your fondest memory of them?

Mine is my Dragonborn Kensai from 3.5. He was a complete boss in combat and was filthy rich. My fondest memory had to be the time i bought some stat boosting items that the other PCs thought were "Garbage" items. They ended up being permanent stat boosts and i never stopped laughing!:smallbiggrin:

The character was my favorite because i felt like we really had something in common, and that he just "fit" my personality. Even though he often seemed jerk-ish he always pulled through for his friends and he never gave up no matter how dire the situation.

So why don't you guys tell me your favorites?

Amaril
2013-02-22, 11:49 AM
My favorite character is Amaril, the elven wizard I play in every campaign where the character makes sense (the avatar I use on here is supposed to be him). I've never really gotten to take him to high levels, since I've had to switch gaming groups and campaigns a lot, but he holds a special place in my heart because he's so much like me. I intentionally designed him to be my avatar in whatever world he inhabits, with almost no change from my own personality. The campaign I'm currently playing him in is a Pathfinder game that definitely seems to be taking off, and I really like the other players and our DM, so I'm hoping this will finally be my chance to fulfill my dream of turning Amaril into an epic-level archmage.

Hunter Noventa
2013-02-22, 12:13 PM
Mine would have to be the character from our previous overpowered campaign. Overpowered as in, gestalt 3.PF with homebrew prestige classes.

Katsumi is a Catfolk Soulknife (PF Version)//Swordsage. She can expend maneuvers to fire giant psionic lasers. Her favored method of taking out the enemy was Erupting Burning Finger. (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cwyVV5_orBo)

She fought the most powerful enemy in the campaign setting, who was pretty much a Physical God (http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/PhysicalGod) and wiped him out in a handful of rounds. She opened the battle about like this (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xqRqhTRndAY&t=1m50s) and it only got more intense from there to the point that the guy killed himself with an epic level spell to banish Katsumi to hell. But she came back.

Griffith!
2013-02-23, 01:25 AM
Mine would be the 3.5 Kashan Krowes, a would-be Red Wizard of Thay. I used this necromancer book I found at the local hobby shop, and he was just an unrepentantly evil wizard in a very awesome way. He made zombies as a hobby, and delighted in dressing his zombie familiar (called Dummy) in costumes and 'disguises.' He hated everyone, elves especially. The only friend he had in the party was this incredibly naive half-elf girl, who he only referred to as 'Breed' and refused to admit he actually liked her.

In the end he wound up saving her from the Red Wizards when the adventure inevitably went wahooni-shaped. It was pretty awesome, the half-elf published his book for him* and he joined the Wall of the Faceless after death. In a later adventure, he scared the crap out of his old party and pulled himself off the wall to drag the BBEG back to the abyss.

*Building a Better Monster: Undead Add-ons and You

Jay R
2013-02-23, 10:43 AM
Jean-Louis, a Flashing Blades Rogue (role-playing in the days of the musketeers).

He was left as an orphan on the steps of Notre Dame cathedral, raised by the nuns of Notre Dame, until he fled at age eight, upon hearing that he was to be taught Latin. Since then he has lived by his wits, developing the skills of a cutpurse and thief.

The game allows each character to have an Advantage and a Secret. The Advantage I took was a Contact. Here's the text I wrote for him:


Master of the Fencing School
Jean-Louis, at age 14, was climbing and exploring. Finding an open window, he entered the lavish rooms. He was surprised in one room by a middle-aged man in a nightgown who grabbed a sword off the wall and challenged Jean-Louis.

Although Jean-Louis had a rapier, he had only fought untrained street ruffians like himself, and had an entirely unjustified high opinion of his own fencing skills. Drawing his sword and attacking, he was astounded to be:

1) parried,
2) sidestepped,
3) swatted on the butt with the flat of the blade, and
4) admonished to "Point your toe forward, don't lean over, hold the pommel up, keep your point on line, don't telegraph your blows."
Jean-Louis had no idea what was going on, and charged again, with similar results. This time he was told that he had managed to combine the elegance of a plough horse with the killer instinct of a milk cow. After the next pass, the man screamed, "Point your foot at me, fool!" Rather to his own surprise, Jean-Louis did. For the next five minutes, he was subjected to his first fencing lesson, at two in the morning, in a house he'd broken into, from a man in a nightgown.

It broke up when Jean-Louis's stomach rumbled. The fencing master asked him when he'd last eaten, and Jean-Louis said three days ago. (A flat lie -- he'd had a perfectly good crust of bread a day and a half ago. But street urchins always say they haven't eaten in three days, even when they're hopelessly overstuffed.)

The master fed him, and asked many questions. (Maítre Francis Toquin is involved in politics, and was frankly wondering which of his enemies had sent so hopelessly incompetent an assassin.) Deciding that Jean-Louis was too foolish to be a spy, the fencing master offered to teach him at the Toquin Fencing School.

Jean-Louis couldn't find the place the next day, since he had been too embarrassed to admit that he couldn't read. He next saw Maítre Toquin three weeks later, and was escorted to the school.

Several years later, Jean-Louis is an assistant at the school, and has the friendship of the master.

His secret was a Secret Origin.


Jean-Louis was a foundling, left at Notre Dame in a basket. Nothing is known about him except that he was left with a satin blanket with the monogram "JL". Is it a clue to his parentage? Is he the bastard son of a noble with those initials? Or was he born to a servant girl who stole the blanket? Is he the inconveniently legal heir that somebody wants dead? He does not know, although he still has the blanket.

Note to GM: Neither the character nor the player has any idea what this means. If you choose to clear up the mystery, the secret could easily develop into a Secret Identity, Sworn Vengeance, or Blackmailed, depending on the details. Feel free to use it any way you choose. A monogram cannot be traced (how many JLs are there?), but it might be recognized by a family member, washerwoman, or the original embroiderer. It could also be a blind to the child's identity.

The DM loved the lack of background, and developed his history. So he left clues that I (eventually) followed, leading to Jean-Louis finding his family history. He's the child of the daughter of a noble family who ran off with a Huguenot clerk. This put him in the middle of religious conflict, noble conflict, class conflict, regional conflict, etc.

scurv
2013-02-23, 10:58 AM
Wow, small list time for me

Sparrow a sparrow hengeyokai. Rogue/psionist toxicologist/artist Originality she was suppose to be a NPC assassin in my own campaign But My gnommer crap pile died early in the session ( It was a good death, he road a beholder into a sunset) and the dm told me to grab one of my minny boss's for his campaign (it was somewhat OP campaign world)

On the bright side she was quite a bit fun to play, A very detached and distant personalty and actually she would of made a credible bard. I kept her skills split between artistic and professional and her combat style was poisoned/acidic projectiles. Only thing I would wish for that one though would of been for her to have a good death. It was a fun campaign but when it ended I had no finish for her story.

Re'ozul
2013-02-24, 04:01 PM
My current Kalashtar Cleric in a 4E game.
The party is evil, though its the lawful, "take over things" evil.
My cleric (named Chaktavash) has pretty much two functions in the game.
In combat he is a healbot with effectively no equal, outside of combat though he is a diplomacy machine driven by a greed so intense the player who played a greedy tiefling rogue the game before has called him worse than her own character.

Anything shiny or interesting (arcane/divine or mundane) he will take or take over. However, he wants to be viewed as a nice guy by the common folk, so if possible said aquisitions always go according to law ... with some bribes attached.

His first bit of diplomacy at level one (combined with a lucky perception crit and a bluff) set in motion events that netted the party an airship. Afterwards he bought two villas that drig dealers had been operating out of, and took over said dealing. Then came a 100k gp gambling fraud. Said fraud netted us also a flat that he gave over to street urchins who he uses as an information network. Then we found teleport gates in an old ruined temple in a park, so he bought the temple (took us 5 levels to figure out the gates). Afterwards we took over a stone giant fortress and hired some mercenaries to keep it operating and recently we took over a flying aboleth island (though its very slow).

He is also a ritual fanatic to the point that he has every ritual below level 10 by now and tends to use them a'la Apple: "There's a ritual for that". (he spent lots of money to draw a ward around the city to keep out an advancing army of undead recently).

His diplomacy abilities have also been of help at some points, though they don't gel that well with another party member, a Gnoll Battlemind. That one makes for an interesting dynamic. He is the main tank of the party and as such the main target for healing so we should try to work well together. He doesn't like Chak's propensity for declaring everything "his" however. (generally shouting 'OUR' when Chaktavash pronounces something, mainly the ship, as 'his') This came to head recently when we got a magic carpet as a present and he gave an ultimatum that he wanted either the ship or the carpet as his, he got the carpet.

I just love playing the guy who wants everything and can get most people to give him things via diplomacising or straight up lying or misguiding (which i try to play, not roll) but come battle has not a single damage-power for purpose of plausible deniability. One day he will get his goal of making up a new religion that is all a front for getting more money, and people will love him for it.

P.S. Also the Gnoll is jealous because Chak's 'mineminemine' attitude has netted him elderscale armor so that his bog standard AC is 38 at level 17 where as the Gnoll only has 33.

Surfnerd
2013-02-24, 10:57 PM
Shetezara Glendare T'skrang Swordmaster. Man she was a kick in the pants to play. Probably one of the only characters I ever played all the way thru to retirement. So sassy. I believe the consensus amongst our group was she was a bright red lizard version of Roseanne Barr!!!! I believe my taunt talent was off the charts.

The GM of that game and the players made that probably the best campaign ever. She retired to head her house and command a successful and shrewd trading company.

The Dark Fiddler
2013-02-25, 06:25 AM
Every time I play him, I fall in love with Garvel Garveny, Imperial Psyker, more and more. There's nothing particularly astounding about him, except for his devotion to the Emperor and his friends, and his absolute disdain for daemons. It shouldn't be extraordinary, but since every other person he meets seems to be working with daemons and chaos gods, he feels himself and his allies to be the last bastions of devoutness.

Which made it all the more poignant when he decided to kill himself after being possessed by a daemon (and, thanks to Fate Points, he failed... not before reducing his Fellowship to 9, though).

Morbis Meh
2013-02-25, 03:17 PM
Well I have certainly played powerful PC's in my time but my favorite is the one I am playing now: Apachai Hopachai (yes I built a character around an anime character) a warblade//Goliath/Monk/Fighter (dungeon crasher)/psion (this is not exactly accurate from the show's standpoint but it is funny to say things like 'When Apachai think really hard he float, you watch Apachai will show you AAAAAAAPPPPAAAAAAAAAAAAA! You see? Now DODGE~!' )

Basically whenever he hits anything he gets a free bullrush and trip attempt (due to knockback/knockdown) then proceeds to punch through a wall for funsies. Everyone loves Apachai (he has an Int of 14 symbolizes his actual strategic thinking via Othello and a wisdom of 8 because he has no self control) He has a flaw called deadly strength which he utilizes to the fullest (apachai breaks things and it makes very sad :smallfrown: he is never allowed to have pets...)

EccentricCircle
2013-02-25, 04:58 PM
Nikolas Adelfi: Renowned Storyteller- Bard, Magic Item salesman, Semi-Retired Adventurer, and Impromtu Chef.

He had a mysterious past as an adventurer, but had retired and assumed a new identity; setting himself up as a travelling storyteller and magic item salesman. He had two horses and a wagon with the words "Adelfi's Arcane Accoutrements" stenciled on the side, the cost of which took all his gold, so that he didn't actually have any magical items to sell at the start of his travels. He got by telling tall tales inspired by his adventuring days, but his adventures turned out to be far from over. His finest hour was when he was cooking breakfast for the party outside his wagon (parked illegally on a city street) and realised that he could sell Bacon and Eggs at a profit to the passers by who kept asking if he was selling Bacon and Eggs.

He was kind of a Bard/ Rogue/ Swashbuckler mechanically speaking, but who cares?

HyperionWolf
2013-02-26, 12:17 PM
Aloe Redstar Crossblades, a 3.5E Forgotten Realms LN Fighter.

What I loved about him that he worshiped a minor deity, the Red Knight, even more than the Tyr cleric worshiped his deity. He had also a lot of minor addictions, that often made him a comic relief (even though most of the time he was mature and sane), such as chicken with wine.

In his first Boss Battle, at level two, he managed to one-hit an ogre who was supposed to give lots of trouble. (Barbarian class levels!) He was not THAT optimized, but he was quite a good charger.

My favorite moment, however, was when the party rogue got knocked down, and we needed to disable a trap so we could run from a party of orcs that was searching for us. The aforementioned cleric was trying hard to make an effective plan to heal him up before the orcs arrived, and Aloe simply said " All right. It's either him or all of us. Throw the bastard in the trap, let it spring, and we run like hell. Do you Agree? Tell you what, If you pay attention to my feet..."
And he kicked the rogue in the trap, effectively killing him, and run away.

While that was not a lawful action, he had an excuse: The rogue had stealed his holy ornament ( a knight chess piece with some rubies), and sold it. Mr. Redstar here was just waiting for the right moment for bitter revenge.
The rogue player wasnt even mad. We all laughed.:smalltongue:

Minitroll
2013-02-27, 12:40 AM
Good old Tuti Turit, the halfling Summoner (Pathfinder) who singlehandidly, without a party conned the government out of 100 million gold then convinced some Ogres to attack the government and take over, create a government conspiracy, abandon the government and watch the ensuing wars... at level 1.

BEAT THAT, MORTALS! Plus 10 to Diplomacy and 20 Charisma laughs at all of you.

Morph Bark
2013-02-27, 09:41 AM
Good old Tuti Turit, the halfling Summoner (Pathfinder) who singlehandidly, without a party conned the government out of 100 million gold then convinced some Ogres to attack the government and take over, create a government conspiracy, abandon the government and watch the ensuing wars... at level 1.

BEAT THAT, MORTALS! Plus 10 to Diplomacy and 20 Charisma laughs at all of you.

That sounds like the DM wasn't even trying to make things challenging, if you could do that with a mere +10 to Diplomacy or at level 1.

Minitroll
2013-02-27, 11:27 AM
That sounds like the DM wasn't even trying to make things challenging, if you could do that with a mere +10 to Diplomacy or at level 1.

It was mostly roleplaying- the government hired me to go and defeat Ogres. Upon that logic, I made a Knowledge (nobility) check to see that this nation had the largest army stationed near the Ogre's of anything else. However, I had one friend who was waiting to see where I was going, so if I was murdered, people would know and due to my liked status, invoke rebellion. Not only that, but using diplomacy I figured out the army was off doing something else. And this point, my DM was already annoyed that all my rolls had been 17 or above. The government then bolstered my pay for the Ogres to 1 million gold. However, I blackmailed them with the knowledge their army was in an attacking position to other nation and got up to 100 million. Shouldn't of gone that high, but I still had a powerful argument.
After, I went to the Ogres, who I convinced that there was money for them if they attacked the government by bribing each of the 100 Ogres separately with 1000 gold- a successful bribe with diplomacy. And this point, the DM was even more annoyed. After this, I went to another nation that had an unstable relationship with the first nation and told the new nation the first nation's army was on the move. The relationship was unstable to the point that the new nation demanded that the first nation pull out their troops. The first nation didn't, and a war begun.
The DM then ended that one-day campaign.

Raimun
2013-02-27, 12:52 PM
That's a hard question. It really depends on my mood, I guess. Sometimes there's nothing better than playing my detective mage. Other times a Boisterous Bruiser (http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/BoisterousBruiser), with a big hammer, is the epitome of fun.

Kol Korran
2013-03-01, 10:44 AM
wasn't there a similar thread a little while ago?

anyway, I like 3 of my former (one of them present) characters, not due to their power and great prowess, but mostly because they were quite fun to play...

Omen speaker of the Dark Six, Grabba the cursed one. (3.5, Eberron)
Grabba to me is an example of what a good concept and some minor tweaking of rules between player and DM can do.

Grabba was a woman goblin slave to an ogre lord in savage Droaam (a land of monsters in Eberron). She was soon discovered to possess power and skills, some might say a connection to the Dark Six! (Eberron gods of savagery, brutality and chaos. people do not prey to them because they think they will grant favors, but rather to stay their wrath, to appease them so you won’t be struck down) She was allowed to keep practicing her dark ways, to the benefit of the clan, as long as she didn’t get ideas above her station.

Till one day she was told that she was prophecised (by whom?) to leave Droaam and go to the lands of the common races, and to seek a strange group of people, and help and protect them… do that, or your entire tribe suffers! shivering and groveling, utterly bewildered, Grabba obeys.

The way I played Grabba was like a witch of heathen parts, forced to the civilized world, believing and worship cruel gods of misfortune and catastrophe, which she hated but believed were all powerful. Her role in the group was that of the scolding mother, the one who warns and admonish the other PCs for being foolish, for bringing danger and death unto themselves and so on. She was mighty superstitious, and found signs in everything.

which is also where the DM and I collaborated. I loved the basic D&D divination spells, like Omen of Peril, Augury and Divination. I used to use a small bag of all kinds of trinkets and fetishes which i would throw to “read the future”. each one had some sort of an ambiguous meaning, and the DM described (or drew) what Grabba saw, according to what the adventure held, and Grabba gave her meaning. more often than not this was at least close to the target.

officially Grabba was a cleric, but the animal companion feat and a few others enabled her to ride Vorr, her companion wolf. (who later evolved to a worg, and could converse with Grabba and the group as well). this fitted her savage goblin look even more. The Dm agreed to play with what would be her skills and amount of skills in retrun for lowering her armor proficiency to those of a druid. in fitted her savage witch quite nicely- more skilled in the natural ways then civilized ways. Some of you may ask why not go druid all the way? well, i wanted her to have more of a religious content, and for her role she needed clerical spells more, plus some divine feats.

I love the Faiths of Eberron book, and the ways it describe religions, and this enabled me to play on the great magnificent duality of the Dark Six and the Sovereign Host (and a bit of the Silver Flame as well). it enabled to bring fantasy religion to the game in an interesting way, but not a heavy one.

all in all, I remember Grabba’s muttering and cursing and warning, asking the six to forgive these fools, while rushing to heal them or cast a baneful spell on her enemies, as a unique, evocative and flavorful character.

Draco Grum! The (not so) fearsome orc warrior!

http://i283.photobucket.com/albums/kk295/meir_8/mad_orc_by_luk999-d36bbgm.jpg

Draco was made partly as a comic relief character, but turned out to have a bit more depth in him. He began as a half orc who deeply wanted to be accepted by the orc tribe he was born to. So… he tried to emulate orc characteristics to the extreme- be needlessly savage and violent, scorn the puny humans, alves and other common races, and perhaps most impotently- strike fear and terror to the hearts of all, so They will know who is their true master!

He was evil, but the sort of dumb evil, and not very good at what he tries to do. But how can such a character even play in a regular party? well, this is where the pictsies come in! yes! the damn bothering, buggering, annoying pictsies!

For you see, Draco once led a raiding party. being afraid of more armored and well equipped victims, he chose ones “worthy” of his grand stature- a couple of halfling gypsy caravans. He and his group slaughtered them in glee, Draco enjoying and demonstrating his cruelty the most. For this, the gypsy halfling have cursed him- so that the spirits of the halfling tribe (He doesn’t quite know what halflings are though- they are small, sneaky and do magic- so he reasoned they are pictsies) will haunt him and harass him, till he learns to do good in the world, do something worthwhile and heroic…

mechanically draco is a half orc with a high charisma (good presence) low intelligence and wisdom (not necesserily good use of that presence) who is a pathfinder barbarian 1/ oracle the rest, with the revelation of ancestors and curse of haunted representing the horde of pictsies. roleplay wise he is a sort of Ahmed the Dead Terrorist meets Jane from Firefly

Draco was a hoooooot to play! Always saying inappropriate things, trying to impress everyone (“feeeaaar me!”… “are you afraid yet?”) and also playing haunted by mischievous ghosts was grand. The DM and I made 3 mini characters for some ghosts who bothered me- 1 grandpa always scolding Draco, the other a teen age woman who kept telling embarrassing secrets about him, and the last were a couple of twin pictsies who kept stealing his stuff and misplacing them.

But what I found surprising, was that Draco developed deeper, more serious relationships with the group. after a disastrous event were one party member died a gruesome death, he took it upon himself to be the party’s shaman, and even tried to face her killer later, in a deadly battle.

Unfortunately, the party broke down before long, and I wasn’t able to continue playing my beloved Draco. Perhaps one day!

Lynn Ardent, the accidental hero
http://i283.photobucket.com/albums/kk295/meir_8/Lynnfinale_zps13530a1d.jpg

Lynn is a character I’m currently playing, a human woman fighter, who became entangled in a series of events, and ended up a small time hero, at least for now. She doesn’t have any fancy mechanics or feats, no dark and brooding or exceptional back story and her character is not of the common “oh! trouble! lets risk our lives to solve it!” kind of thing. In fact, I tried to make her quite common, at least to begin with…

So what makes Lynn special to me? Well, first of all I like her because she feels more like a real person- flawed, with some prejudices against the other party members at the start (some still linger till now), conflicted between her reason, desires and conscious, and she makes mistakes, some of them are big ones- tactical, social and more. But I feel she struggles, fights, and tries to do better, and live through this mess. And on the way she proves that between all of her faults, she is actually a fairly decent person. (Or at least aspiring to be)

The second reason I love Lynn comes from the interaction with the party members. I hold the view that if the character doesn’t have significant interactions with the party members, that the character is missing. The party interactions define a character just as her back story and personality write up do. Lynn begins as a minor ex_soldier, of a military organization called The Fist, that is quite racist, lawful, and hunts arcane magic users. I wanted her to come from The Fist BECAUSE one party member was a halfling crook, and another was a gnome sorcerer. this sparked quite the conflict in our group, which absolutely made the game, as well as contributed much to the characters. We are fairly long time players who know how to enjoy a conflict without letting it go too much out of hand, so it worked fine. (If you’ve read order of the stick she is kind of the Roy in the party) Lynn learns from her companions in time, and softens somewhat, which leads me to…

The last, but not least reason that I love Lynn is that she develops and grows: In her attitude to the other characters, in her attitude to The Fist and her past, her responsibilities to the world, to magic, her role as a warrior and possibly as leader. It feels like the character is undergoing quite a change, in a fairly real way, without totally changing the core of who she is. character growth at it’s best I feel.

So no super powers, no dazzling origins- just a woman at the right place, at the right time (maybe she’ll disagree), trying to do… perhaps not the right thing, but something that will, well, sort of work for the best, you know?

If you’re interested to learn more, you can read the campaign ("In my sig- "It began with a crash")

(warning: long posts, but some say they are worth it)

Poliochi
2013-03-02, 03:17 AM
Ah yes, my second character I ever played in a (3.5) campaign... the first was a paladin named Charles Martel, but he had to go when the party decided they were too dedicated to doing the occasional evil deed like selling a minor artifact of evil (that does nothing but attract all evil creatures in a 1-mile radius and make them try to kill the owner and take the artifact) to some random merchant. And they called me Lawful Stupid. :smallannoyed:

And my second character, ELODIN STORMCROW, SORCERER SUPREME! Amusingly enough, I started out just calling him Elodin, but one of the other players in the group disparagingly called him Stormcrow as a LotR reference, and it stuck. Among other things, Elodin killed Count Strahd twice (the first time was a last-hit, the second time was a few levels later in our heavily-edited Ravenloft II), saved everyone in the party by throwing his cloak over the artifact that ate their souls (their souls were, thankfully, put back), killing the demilich construct in the Tomb of Horrors with a flask of alchemist's fire after the rest of the group had died (fun fact, not immune to nonmagical fire, and no energy resistance), and (depending on whether or not he's on hiatus or actually retired) will probably be responsible for raising a rebellion and defeating a cabal of liches who aim to take over the world.

One of my favorite stories was this one adult blue dragon we fought, back when that was level appropriate. We got to its lair, and instead of going in the front door, we went in through the top. It was a dead volcano or something, so it was a straight shot down from the top to the dragon. I dropped a rock on it, and it flew up at us. We immediately responded by jumping down into its lair (with various methods to land safely, of course). Because of a bad initiative roll, I was the last one down, and had the dragon breathing lightning at me as we shot down. Naturally, I was riding a flying broom. By some miracle, I made every skill check I needed to do the following:
-Pull up from a straight dive to flying back up, while coming close enough to the ground to...
-...activate my wand of stoneshape, which by a concentration check I was able to...
-...create a massive, 5ft wide stone spear out of the ground as I flew by.
The dragon landed on the pillar of stone and took about half its health in damage from the hard landing. Good times.