Your favourite outside the box character

[moonfly7]

Ive found precious few places where you can find real gems about weird yet effective concepts that are creative, well thought out and funny. Please share your concepts and the stories that go with them on this humble thread

[Trask]

My weirdest character came about when my Indiana Jones style fighter found a sword imbued with wild magic, and then soon got imprisoned in a tomb for 500 years and went mad.

When he came out he was no longer Lemon Jackson the treasure hunter, but Medley the Mad, a hexblade/wild mage.

It was a fun concept and quite effective in combat, although it completely embraced chaos as I was effectively rolling on 2 separate wild magic tables, one for the sword and one for my spells.

My DM ruled that I could refresh tides of chaos every time I cast a spell, so I was rolling quite often, with advantage on my weapon attacks, while constantly having a barrage of chaos buffet everything around me in melee.

[Particle_Man]

Dmg skeleton berserker can rage and frenzy without worrying about exhaustion. He could be the one good skeleton, the risen remains of a hermit who discovered a pool that could make good skeletons if a living host sacrificed themselves willingly. The skeleton kept the hermit’s notes and hopes to pass them on to someone worthy.

[Man_Over_Game]

Ive found precious few places where you can find real gems about weird yet effective concepts that are creative, well thought out and funny. Please share your concepts and the stories that go with them on this humble thread


Moon Druid X, Barbarian 1, Gnome:
Small fry who transforms into the most dangerous beasts you've ever faced. This tiny guy is resistant to your weapons, resists your mind magic, and overall is frustratingly hard to kill. He gets impulsively angry at things that are bigger than him, which led him to learning how to become something larger.


Crown Paladin with the Shield Master feat:
Is a Valkyrie that only aids those who aren't cowards. If you want healing, you first have to be dying. If you want protecting, then you first have to join him in melee combat. If you want to take advantage of the fact that he knocks down enemies, then get in there. This Paladin isn't here for pansies. If you want saving, go earn it!


Life Cleric with Heavy Armor Master, Warding Bond, and 3 levels into Sorcerer (for Twin Spell and Distant Spell):
Is a Cleric that enjoys pain. So much so that he absorbs the pain of his allies, and makes sure that everyone stays alive long enough to suffer even more.


Ancestral Guardian with Mobile:
A cowardly Barbarian who is the troublemaking prince of his tribe, haunted by his ancestors and fallen brothers. As he runs around, taunting enemies and fleeing, his ancestors protect his allies as an apology for the antics of the young and cowardly prince.

[sithlordnergal]

I have one rather out of the ordinary Half Elf named Shiki. She is an AL Legal character, so feel free to use this build. She is:

Oath of the Ancients Paladin: 8

Divine Soul Sorcerer: 1

Circle of Dreams Druid: 6


I plan on maxing her out with 5 more Druid levels to get her the bonus action Teleport that Dream Druids get.

Shiki is a highly effective Front Line fighter and support character. Thanks to having a Staff of Power, Shillelgah, Polearm Master, and the ability to Smite, she can put down plenty of damage when she needs to. But at the same time, she has a bunch of at-will, non-magical healing from Lay on Hands and Balm of the Summer Court. I focused on her Wisdom more then Charisma, so her Druid spells are highly effective. Not to mention she has the spell slots of an 11th level caster to Smite with, and the one level of Sorcerer gave her access to the Shield Spell.

The only downsides are that her Charisma is maxed out at 18, and she has to use Scorpion Plate Armor in order to get high AC. Though I did hear of a module that grants +2 stone plate that Druids can wear, so I'm hoping to upgrade eventually. I'll be honest, she's a lot more effective then I thought she'd be.

Shiki is a Half-Elf that grew up in Chult. Her father was an elven Druid while her mother was a Silver Dragonborn. She grew up helping to defend their village from wandering beasts and undead with her Father, slowly learning how to use Druidic magic. He taught her how to use a Quarterstaff, and she became very skilled with the weapon. However, before she became a full fledged Druid, she met a Paladin of the Ancients named Elliot Weston. After helping him deal with a small infestation of Undead, Elliot offered to take her on as an apprentice to teach her how to become a Paladin like him.

Shiki accepted the offer, as she felt it would be a far more effective way to defend her home from the frequent Undead attacks. She left her village, much to her father's disappointment, and joined Elliot as he took her to a nearby camp for the Order of the Gauntlet. She eventually succeeded in becoming a Paladin, and her first mission sent her to some ancient ruins that had been the site of the Weeping War. She nearly lost her life in the Ruins as she defended her comrades from an endless hoard of Demons, and only survived because the Necromancer saved her.

Afterwards she was sent to the underdark to help deal with a Demon infestation that turned out to be far worse then she had imagined, as the Demons had actually managed to enter the Material Plane through a rift. It was during this adventure that she accidentally summoned Zariel to help deal with the Demon invasion. Despite that small mistake, they managed to force the Demons back and, thanks to her dedication and skill, she was granted some magic in the form of becoming a Divine Soul.

[moonfly7]

My weirdest character came about when my Indiana Jones style fighter found a sword imbued with wild magic, and then soon got imprisoned in a tomb for 500 years and went mad.

When he came out he was no longer Lemon Jackson the treasure hunter, but Medley the Mad, a hexblade/wild mage.

It was a fun concept and quite effective in combat, although it completely embraced chaos as I was effectively rolling on 2 separate wild magic tables, one for the sword and one for my spells.

My DM ruled that I could refresh tides of chaos every time I cast a spell, so I was rolling quite often, with advantage on my weapon attacks, while constantly having a barrage of chaos buffet everything around me in melee.
This is a thing of true beauty. Madness, yes. But also beauty.

[Tawmis]

Out of the box, varies, I suppose...

For myself, an Out of the Box character was my Tiefling Paladin that followed a Holy God.
It was a fun twist, to have a demonic looking character, bearing the symbol of a holy god of goodness.
And then being able to do Hellish Rebuke when being hit.
Just to show he still had his dark side (that he fought to keep in check).

[moonfly7]

Out of the box, varies, I suppose...

For myself, an Out of the Box character was my Tiefling Paladin that followed a Holy God.
It was a fun twist, to have a demonic looking character, bearing the symbol of a holy god of goodness.
And then being able to do Hellish Rebuke when being hit.
Just to show he still had his dark side (that he fought to keep in check).
One of my players had similare guy, accept he was a celestial warlock who came from a village of tieflings who all traditionaly made pacts with the same vestige, who had once been a benevolent god who was deposed. Anyways, when reading about marks sometimes left by warlock pacts, he calls me and asks if his toefling can be glowing white because of his pact. I think about it, and say sure. I had told them ahead of time one weird change or lineancy or special little staring thing would be allowed per player. So he asks if, for his tiefling, we cam change his hellish rebuke to do radiamt damage. We ended up decreasing the damage die by one, allowing ot to blind his attack for 1d4 rounds, and renaming it as "celestial reprimand" a custom racial trait.

[Tawmis]

One of my players had similare guy, accept he was a celestial warlock who came from a village of tieflings who all traditionaly made pacts with the same vestige, who had once been a benevolent god who was deposed. Anyways, when reading about marks sometimes left by warlock pacts, he calls me and asks if his toefling can be glowing white because of his pact. I think about it, and say sure. I had told them ahead of time one weird change or lineancy or special little staring thing would be allowed per player. So he asks if, for his tiefling, we cam change his hellish rebuke to do radiamt damage. We ended up decreasing the damage die by one, allowing ot to blind his attack for 1d4 rounds, and renaming it as "celestial reprimand" a custom racial trait.

That's an excellent twist - and nice variation/custom racial trait. It's one of the wonderful things about D&D, when you have players and DMs so willing to work together, to create the best experience possible for everyone involved!

[TheCleverGuy]

I haven't actually done this yet, but I have an idea for an Elf Ancients Paladin who was actually a reincarnated Dwarf. He was the appointed guardian for a circle of Druids, and when he died they used Reincarnate to bring him back. He has to retrain his new body to return to his former combat prowess and restore his faith over time. RP-wise, he'd constantly be reaching to stroke his non-existant beard and bumping his head on low ceilings.

[No brains]

I played a high elf trickery cleric once. People here will say that trickery cleric is a puzzling enough choice, but high elf makes that extra strange, but sometimes one wizard cantrip is all it takes to pull off some good spy work.

[Wizard_Lizard]

gninja gnomes.

[Arkhios]

An elaborately tattooed big burly northerner, braided long beard, and braided long hair, donned into a sleeveless chain hauberk under wolf pelts and bone jewelry. Carrying a big-ass warhammer with the business end a conventionalized snarling wolf's head, and a sword with runic carvings depicting slain dragons. Sounds like a Totem Warrior Barbarian, doesn't he?

Nope, he's a pure Sacred Oath of the Ancients Paladin, and the second iteration of my first and still favorite 5th edition character. He's a firm believer of the Old Faith, another name for the druidic religion in many settings. For example in Forgotten Realms. His background is a refluffed Uthgardt Tribe Member (because we don't play in Forgotten Realms and Uthgardt Tribes are Forgotten Realms specific), and he's just as good nature survivalist as our druid or ranger (which, consequently, proves the point why Ranger is poorly designed for the niche it was intended for; if a simple background can do the same as a class designed for things like that, it's not right)

[Trask]

An elaborately tattooed big burly northerner, braided long beard, and braided long hair, donned into a sleeveless chain hauberk under wolf pelts and bone jewelry. Carrying a big-ass warhammer with the business end a conventionalized snarling wolf's head, and a sword with runic carvings depicting slain dragons. Sounds like a Totem Warrior Barbarian, doesn't he?

Nope, he's a pure Sacred Oath of the Ancients Paladin, and the second iteration of my first and still favorite 5th edition character. He's a firm believer of the Old Faith, another name for the druidic religion in many settings. For example in Forgotten Realms. His background is a refluffed Uthgardt Tribe Member (because we don't play in Forgotten Realms and Uthgardt Tribes are Forgotten Realms specific), and he's just as good nature survivalist as our druid or ranger (which, consequently, proves the point why Ranger is poorly designed for the niche it was intended for; if a simple background can do the same as a class designed for things like that, it's not right)

I'm a fan of Druidism as the "Old Faith". It gives Druidism as sense of wider place rather than radical environmentalism.

I had an Oath of the Ancients paladin based on the Green Knight in the story Sir Gawaine and the Green Knight. A very large bulky man in an antlered helm, riding an elk with braided green hair and a large green beard bedecked in green painted plate. A little more stereotypical but I as well love the feel that the oath of ancients brings. That PC ended up being a sort of bridge between the realm of man and the realm of faerie, and being deeply connected to the spirits of the land. Thats how I like to play my Druids as well, a bridge between civilization and the older, more primal ways.

Also that character description just sounded so good, I'm gonna need to use it for an NPC :smallbiggrin:

[Trickery]

Subtle Sorcerer fooling people into thinking he doesn't know magic; he's just lucky. Can be effective on a coffeelock, although I know that's contentious around here.

[Arkhios]

I'm a fan of Druidism as the "Old Faith". It gives Druidism as sense of wider place rather than radical environmentalism.

I had an Oath of the Ancients paladin based on the Green Knight in the story Sir Gawaine and the Green Knight. A very large bulky man in an antlered helm, riding an elk with braided green hair and a large green beard bedecked in green painted plate. A little more stereotypical but I as well love the feel that the oath of ancients brings. That PC ended up being a sort of bridge between the realm of man and the realm of faerie, and being deeply connected to the spirits of the land. Thats how I like to play my Druids as well, a bridge between civilization and the older, more primal ways.

Also that character description just sounded so good, I'm gonna need to use it for an NPC :smallbiggrin:

Ha! Be my guest. The character has a traditional tribal pseudonym "Wolfhammer" after the warhammer he wields (also has a real name but that's for "private use"). Feel free to call your NPC Wolfhammer if you want to. I'd be honored.

The chain hauberk is basically a chainmail (obviously?) and I've actually already replaced it with a splint mail, but what wouldn't you do for flavor!

The warhammer is currently non-magical, but the sword is a Dragon Slayer.

The moment I realized that druidism is actually much more than radical treehuggery, I've been unable to even consider any other faiths for my religiously inclined characters. Nature is by far the strongest force in our world and deserves all of our respect.

[Dualswinger]

Tabaxi Druid 3/wizard x

Take every opportunity to increase your speed, then cast spike growth and force them through the area with a grapple