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Ortho
2021-04-23, 01:53 PM
I'm in a 5e D&D campaign, and over the last few sessions I've noticed that I'm playing my character (Vin Mekk, an Artificer with a robotic turret) very inconsistently. Mechanically, she's consistant, but her personality changes from session to session. E.g. one session she wants nothing more than to do peaceful research in her laboratory, the next she's hot-blooded and ok with a first-strike on an orc encampment, etc.

Here's the direction I want to go with Vin:

1) Vin is curious/inquisitive. A magical scientist, effectively.

2) Vin doesn't want to start fights, but she will finish them. With AoEs.

3) Vin is somewhat distrustful of religion/gods, mostly because she's trying to find answers to questions the gods would rather have unasked.

4) Vin is mischievous/a trickster, primarily to act as a foil to the more serious members of the party. And 'cuz it's funny.


Vin Mekk, 7th level human Artillerist Artificer

Personality Traits: I love finding new discoveries! I'm very curious, you see.
Ideals: A mistake isn't something to regret; it's a learning experience!
Bonds: I'm trying to find the answer to a letter that my deceased teacher sent.
Flaws: I'm easily distracted by the promise of discovering something new. I'm a city slicker, through and through - I know nothing about nature.
Background: Sage.

Backstory:
Vinthallius Alonzo Forsythe Lyttonlale Mekk: an immigrant from the city of Hulburry Watch in the Kingdom of Osswald to the colonies, searching for new discoveries to research and unravel. Specifically, she's interested (and specializes in) transportation magic. Looking for an answer to the riddle sent to her by her colleague in Sage background.

Formerly apprenticed to family business (papermaking), but left after a falling-out with parents.


Father:

Cyran Mekk. Elf
Mother:

Roshani Mekk. Human.
Siblings:

Wyrdian, older brother, elf

Salys, younger half-elf brother. Cuith's twin.

Cuith, younger half-elf sister. Salys' twin.



So how do I play Vin consistently?

Jason
2021-04-23, 03:19 PM
You're in luck: the Angry GM just wrote a lengthy article about how to build a character and play it consistently. Go check it out.
https://theangrygm.com/how-to-actually-play-a-character/

I particularly like the comparison with the Trill from Deep Space 9.

Lord Torath
2021-04-23, 07:10 PM
I'm in a 5e D&D campaign, and over the last few sessions I've noticed that I'm playing my character (Vin Mekk, an Artificer with a robotic turret) very inconsistently. Mechanically, she's consistant, but her personality changes from session to session. E.g. one session she wants nothing more than to do peaceful research in her laboratory, the next she's hot-blooded and ok with a first-strike on an orc encampment, etc.

Here's the direction I want to go with Vin:

1) Vin is curious/inquisitive. A magical scientist, effectively.

2) Vin doesn't want to start fights, but she will finish them. With AoEs.

3) Vin is somewhat distrustful of religion/gods, mostly because she's trying to find answers to questions the gods would rather have unasked.

4) Vin is mischievous/a trickster, primarily to act as a foil to the more serious members of the party. And 'cuz it's funny. Why do you think she was so gung ho to take on the orcs? Could it have something to do with Trait 2? Did the orc tribe do something first, and she felt the need to 'finish the fight'? Or perhaps she was really irritated that they were getting in the way of her studying. That leads down a slightly different (darker) path than the first explanation.
Maybe she really hates orcs?

Batcathat
2021-04-24, 11:24 AM
I'm not sure I understand the question. You clearly have at least a basic idea about the personality of your character... so just play her according to that? It might be tough to stay consistent at all times (especially if your character's personality is fairly different from your own personality) but it should get easier with time. Besides, it's not like real people are all that consistent all the time.

Drelua
2021-04-25, 06:24 PM
I find when I'm writing different characters, or trying to think like a character, it helps to have a voice for them, even if it's only in my head. My dwarf that was raised by wolves has a very gruff voice, bad grammar, small vocabulary. He's very direct, and if someone is less direct he might just yell "huh!?" There's also half-orc druid in a story I started who's very thoughtful, pays as much attention to the clouds as the people around her, so pretty much the opposite of the dwarf. Her voice as I imagine it is very calm, she speaks slowly like she's in no hurry and isn't entirely focused on the conversation, doesn't use contractions much. It makes it easier for me to phrase things differently, which can have a big effect on how I think and makes for better dialogue, I think.

A character like yours might speak very quickly, maybe they let their brain get ahead of their mouth when they get excited by doing science at magic. The two really aren't mutually exclusive, in a magical world a character can definitely follow the scientific method in studying how magic works. They might act like the tech guy from an action movie, explaining how things work without realizing that the action hero has no idea what they're talking about and just wants to know what end to point where and what happens when you push the buttons. I might try learning a handful of science-y sounding words and practicing something like the technobabble you'd hear on a low budget sci-fi show, but with magical words mixed in.

"Observing the frequency of the field, I suspect that if I add a few watts of abracadabra to the wavelength I can adjust the tensile strength of the teleportation matrix to increase the range of the spell!" I don't know what that means, but if you start trying to say things like that, it might help you think a certain way.

Frogreaver
2021-04-26, 12:42 AM
I'm in a 5e D&D campaign, and over the last few sessions I've noticed that I'm playing my character (Vin Mekk, an Artificer with a robotic turret) very inconsistently. Mechanically, she's consistant, but her personality changes from session to session. E.g. one session she wants nothing more than to do peaceful research in her laboratory, the next she's hot-blooded and ok with a first-strike on an orc encampment, etc.

Here's the direction I want to go with Vin:

1) Vin is curious/inquisitive. A magical scientist, effectively.

2) Vin doesn't want to start fights, but she will finish them. With AoEs.

3) Vin is somewhat distrustful of religion/gods, mostly because she's trying to find answers to questions the gods would rather have unasked.

4) Vin is mischievous/a trickster, primarily to act as a foil to the more serious members of the party. And 'cuz it's funny.


Vin Mekk, 7th level human Artillerist Artificer

Personality Traits: I love finding new discoveries! I'm very curious, you see.
Ideals: A mistake isn't something to regret; it's a learning experience!
Bonds: I'm trying to find the answer to a letter that my deceased teacher sent.
Flaws: I'm easily distracted by the promise of discovering something new. I'm a city slicker, through and through - I know nothing about nature.
Background: Sage.

Backstory:
Vinthallius Alonzo Forsythe Lyttonlale Mekk: an immigrant from the city of Hulburry Watch in the Kingdom of Osswald to the colonies, searching for new discoveries to research and unravel. Specifically, she's interested (and specializes in) transportation magic. Looking for an answer to the riddle sent to her by her colleague in Sage background.

Formerly apprenticed to family business (papermaking), but left after a falling-out with parents.


Father:

Cyran Mekk. Elf
Mother:

Roshani Mekk. Human.
Siblings:

Wyrdian, older brother, elf

Salys, younger half-elf brother. Cuith's twin.

Cuith, younger half-elf sister. Salys' twin.



So how do I play Vin consistently?

Sometimes you play your character to see where the campaign takes them. Other times you play the campaign to find out what they are like. That is, IMO the best characters have a concept that isn’t yet fully set in stone that can organically grow in the campaign.

So perhaps the orc first strike sounded good at the time but is a regret the character now has and is pushing her even more toward no first strikes. That gives you the vision you have for the character and explains why they are that way through in game events.

It’s okay for characters to change as you play them. Their ideas, bonds and flaws don’t have to be set in stone for all eternity.

Morgaln
2021-04-26, 04:33 AM
I fully agree with frogreaver.

My advice is, don't second guess what you are doing all the time. Have your character do what feels right in a situation. When you feel that she did act out of character, don't try to justify it outside the game. Instead, acknowledge that it was unusual behavior for her and consider how she would react to doing something she wouldn't usually do. Does she try to justify it to herself? Go in denial? Feel guilty and try to make it up somehow? In other words, don't mull over past behavior but let it influence future behavior. And if it turns out you keep doing the same out of character action repeatedly, build it in. Maybe it's a part of her character she tries to keep suppressed but it bursts out once in a while. Awesome, you discovered something new about her.

Sometimes, a character just takes over and makes us go a completely different direction than we intended. I still remember my first Mage: the Ascension character. I had envisioned her as a young, naive Wicca fluffy-bunny, i. e. someone who thinks magic works the way it does in shows like Buffy and Charmed (which, incidentally, means that in M:tA magic does work like that for her). About half a session into the game, it became very apparent that she was an headstrong,confident, somewhat aggressive woman with a very acerbic tongue who would not let anyone try to claim authority over her. It was very different from what I had imagined, but it worked with the group and so I rolled with it and let Julia be who she clearly wanted to be.

MarkVIIIMarc
2021-04-27, 08:17 PM
This is more serious advice than it sounds:

Sometimes I am impatient with my kids, sometimes I can sit for hours and put up will all kinds of stuff.

Why wouod your character be different?

We all have moments.

Slipjig
2021-05-05, 12:24 PM
Come up with a couple of characteristics that define your character, write them down, and keep them in front of you.

But remember that real people don't display their dominant personality traits 100% of the time, so we shouldn't expect PCs to, either. It's ABSOLUTELY okay for your character to deviate from those characteristics. Maybe your character discovers in a crisis that she isn't who she thought she was, or maybe she's growing under the stresses of adventuring. Or maybe she's just naturally mercurial.