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cheesecake
2008-03-22, 09:17 AM
My D&D group(last time we played was several months ago) I was always the biggest roleplayer. I tried to play to my alignment, I have probably made 100 halfing rogues/rangers since I was 14 and usually they are all different. Personalities, sometimes I pick a phobia to have fun with, different mind sets, and try to play along with a background story that I made up. So on and so forth. Even if it proves to be a problem for my character I just play it out. The best example of this, my buddy had a phobia chart and we could pick out an extra basic weapon if we took one and roleplayed it. I picked out "Deathly afraid of insects" I had fun with it at first, the adventure was a scavenger hunt on an island. Well, get off the boat, boat pulls away, and what is the first encounter giant wasps and what was the big boss that we had to fight to get the last piece....another dragon sized wasp. Yeah, it was fun.

What do you guys do to make your character your interesting? Or are you just like half the other people in my group no matter what race/class combo they are playing they are just a sheet of paper and you can't tell the difference?(I hate that!!)

Like the idiot who rolled a paladin and halfway through the campaign he pulls a Belkar and knifed our informant for no reason at all......Hello warrior without bonus feats.

Chosen_of_Vecna
2008-03-22, 09:47 AM
Some of us can roleplay without being gimmicky.

MorkaisChosen
2008-03-22, 09:49 AM
I remember my brother playing a pilot who was afraid of insects in a Star Wars D20 game. We were fighting some of those nasty centipede things (cam't remember the name) and I don't think he missed one shot in the whole encounter... He had a bit of a reputation after that!

senrath
2008-03-22, 10:03 AM
Depending on the group I'm with, I roleplay more or less. I find it hard to roleplay in a group where no one else does. Of course, I always stick to my alignment and character personality, and try to get everyone else to do the same. Unfortunately, that usually comes down to (since the group I'm in right now is not that big into roleplaying) "I think this is most likely a trap, but since my character would walk right into it, that's what I'm gonna do".

Deepblue706
2008-03-22, 10:13 AM
Some of us can roleplay without being gimmicky.

Some around here also are completely unwilling or even unable to play a character with flaws or other disadvantages simply because they're dull and boring people.

@OP: I love this kind of stuff. GURPS (Generic Universal Role Playing System) is a point-based system that I like to use as an alternative to D&D - and it has a lot of ways to support it. I personally believe addressing not just a character's strengths but quirks and flaws, etc, really add to vermisilitude because it gives you more dimensions. Unless everyone is playing an absolutely larger-than-life character (which isn't necessarily inherent when you're playing D&D), I really don't think any character should be without imperfections.

nobodylovesyou4
2008-03-22, 10:57 AM
i roleplay, occassionally, when i can get into character. last night, i was playing a psion/flayerspawn psychic elan who was completely convinced he was, and always had been, a mindflayer. His psicrystal was shaped like a brain, and i would interrupt the game at points to talk to myself and play out conversations between my mindflayer ("Fred") and his crystal ("Brain-O"). unfortunately, my friend also roleplayed a lot that night - as a flaming gay dwarf dervish. i shudder thinking about it.

cheesecake
2008-03-22, 11:09 AM
Some around here also are completely unwilling or even unable to play a character with flaws or other disadvantages simply because they're dull and boring people.

@OP: I love this kind of stuff. GURPS (Generic Universal Role Playing System) is a point-based system that I like to use as an alternative to D&D - and it has a lot of ways to support it. I personally believe addressing not just a character's strengths but quirks and flaws, etc, really add to vermisilitude because it gives you more dimensions. Unless everyone is playing an absolutely larger-than-life character (which isn't necessarily inherent when you're playing D&D), I really don't think any character should be without imperfections.

We played with Allergies sometimes too. My buddy who roleplays along with me most of the time, was allergic to dust. Obviously if you start sneezing in the middle of a spell its not good. We had fun with that. No character is super-human. And I hate people who play generic evil, generic good. Thats gimmicky. Hey I'm evil so I have to kill that person for no reason...Or I'm good so I have to save that person. Shades of Grey!

Bosaxon
2008-03-22, 11:30 AM
As I typically play supporting characters, I tend not to have much dialogue role-playing. Occasionally I might get into heated debates with NPC's over the morals of necromancy, but these are rare, as the other party doesn't live that long. Most of my role-playing comes down to behavioral actions. Using the same character used my dialogue example, he might free a prisoner from jail for killing someone while at the same time killing a liar who I know killed someone but lied to me about it.

Arbitrarity
2008-03-22, 12:37 PM
Does a three-hour negotiation session count?

RTGoodman
2008-03-22, 12:46 PM
Depending on the group I'm with, I roleplay more or less. I find it hard to roleplay in a group where no one else does.

Yep, that's about how I feel. Most of my groups that I play with don't really roleplay at all other than "I'm a Dwarf/Barbarian so I get drunk" or "I'm a Monk so I go meditate." With my current character, I started out roleplaying a lot, but seeing that no one else did I basically cut back.

Other times, though, if more people are into it, then I roleplay considerably more. The last time we played a FR game (for all of two sessions), I don't know if I rolled more than 2 dice, but I spent most of the sessions just roleplaying. The others did the same, and it worked well.

ChazFox
2008-03-22, 01:18 PM
The sessions I've played in have always been RP-tastic :D I almost always love to play the coward of the team, usually because nobody else does. XD

Boy oh boy how I love to play a fear of spiders, as well as other insects. ^^

First encounter we had with a giant spider, my character instantly hid behind whatever he could find. After that we ran into some raptors and after taking a hit, I promptly fled. Shortly afterwards I returned, and everyone was calling me a coward (Roleplay wise of course. We all agreed that the party dynamics were brilliant that session ^^)

Dr Bwaa
2008-03-22, 07:59 PM
As a player, I love role playing, and I will always role play my characters, usually to their deaths. My group is not optimized by any means; just lots of fun. I'm playing a fighter from a military family, but who is chaotic neutral: his loyalty lies with his friends, and nowhere else. This has been a problem when he (as a high-ranking member of the city guard) was called upon to go arrest a couple of his friends for suspicion of sorcery (in this society, that's essentially a death sentence), so he got the other guards alone and slew them in one round. Then he faked a battle with his rogue friend so the last member of the arresting squad (a higher-level paladin) would come give him a hand; while he was gone the sorceress escaped from the handcuffs, as did the monk next to her (cantrips to freeze the handcuffs, monk attacks to sunder them!), and then the party was forced to flee the city. Claaus (my fighter) fell in love with the sorceress, and has now grown up from his level 3 Fighter With A Longsword And Cleave into a Fighter 7/Devoted Defender 6: not optimized by any stretch of the imagination, but that's what he wanted to do. This is the most fun I have ever had in a game of D&D.

As a DM, I try in any way I can to encourage role playing. it doesn't always work, but I think the game is much more fun that way.

DementedFellow
2008-03-22, 08:10 PM
I like the role playing part. But when games are just hack-n-slash, I need to not roleplay and just become quiet. It's simply not fun if you're the only one doing it.

In an homage to OotS, my last character was afraid of trees.:smallwink:

LoneStarNorth
2008-03-22, 09:13 PM
I play mostly PbP, so I've always roleplayed a lot. I've only been in three real-life games. In the first, the roleplaying was minimal, but I still tried to stick to my dwarven barbarian's personality. He defended captured hobgoblins from our "lawful good" cleric that wanted to work them to death building his fortress, but when he got reincarnated as a halfling, it ruined his tough-guy image and he got gradually more and more violent and cruel. I eventually had to drop the game, but I left instructions with the DM to make my old character a recurring villain :smallamused:

The last two games, I've been DM. The first was a solo campaign to teach my friend the game. She roleplayed her character a lot, and so I responded by throwing in character voices and fleshing out my NPCs more. In my current game, the players don't roleplay as much, but sometimes it pops up. In our last session we talked in-character a lot while they were tracking down a thieves' guild. I was very pleased with it and I hope to see more of the same.

So yeah, I like to play my characters to their personalities and write detailed backstories. It's the best part of the game :smallsmile:

TempusCCK
2008-03-22, 09:52 PM
Actually, I role play quite a bit, but my games are really frustrating because all of my friends spend times hatching elborate and silly plans and not understanding their class features.

That's when we're not asking the DM to explain everything twice because no one pays attention during anyone elses turn.

drengnikrafe
2008-03-22, 10:49 PM
I usually try to play my mental stats as well as I can, although I have a hard time breaking very far above my own stats, and I have a really hard time thinking only in game. I'm consistantly speaking Meta Game. Although, when my mental stats start falling, I start playing them. Low INT? Speak in the third person. Low Wisdom? Don't try to justify plans. Low CHA? Don't speak.

It's kind of a freeing experience, though, to pretend to be something totally different, and stick to it.

Dark Knight Renee
2008-03-22, 10:50 PM
Some of us can roleplay without being gimmicky.

Some around here also are completely unwilling or even unable to play a character with flaws or other disadvantages simply because they're dull and boring people.

I treat each of my characters like a real person (well, except that I'd never be quite so cruel to a real person, but besides that), and roleplay heavily. While they might have some intersting traits, these aren't used as gimicks to add spice, but rather as aspects of the character. A gimicky character who relies on their interesting trait too heavily can come off as flat, but whether or not the trait is a gimick depends largely on how it's used.

For me, usually the most interesting traits are the ones my characters pick up during play, rather than anything asigned during character creation. As most of these characters are in rather long-running games, they tend to pick up a lot of baggage. For example, a do-gooder vampire character with lowish wisdom, large (but diminishing) quantities of angst, no less than three love triangles, an unhealthy co-dependant relationship with a psycho party member (who is also his rival in two of those love triangles), a fear of total darkness, a severe loathing of letters and writen notes, and a halucination that talks to him a la Haley's Self Loathing.

He started off as a do-gooding fop. With low wisdom.

Dr Bwaa
2008-03-22, 10:57 PM
Amendment to my last post, with a couple other thoughts:

As a DM, I require a backstory. (Small) In-game rewards given out for having a good, thoughtful, detailed one.

As a player, I've only played one REALLY hack-n-slash campaign. We all started at lvl 10, and the DM just throws stuff at us from wherever he dredges up in the bowels of his mind (one encounter, we played through the Durance of Hate from Diablo II, culminating in fighting Mephisto (http://www.ociototal.com/recopila2/r_juegos/imag/diablo2_mephisto.jpg), for example). That game is tremendous fun. Even though it's all hack-n-slash, we all still roleplay our characters. The party is largely evil aligned, my character is a dwarf fighter specializing in the Bat'Leth (http://www.hms-studios.com/pictures/startrek/bat'leth.jpg). This has been the loudest, most raucous, craziest game ever. The players communicate mostly by yelling, or having their characters smash things, but everything is done IC. Everyone made characters fun enough that they were fine yelling at each other IC at all times, and while it seems like a very crazy game session, the end result it everyone having an awful lot of fun and the verisimilitude staying obscenely intact. With the right group of people, even a hack-n-slash can be a great roleplaying experience.

Roderick_BR
2008-03-22, 11:03 PM
I check the character's base stats, alignment, race, and 1st class, and then write down a short background. The rest of the personality I develop as we play.

Half-blood
2008-03-22, 11:12 PM
I always do My Hardest to roleplay my characters to a Great extent. Going so far as to actually "Mechanically" hurt my character out of his enjoyment. (Smoking)

Ascension
2008-03-23, 12:19 AM
I have to admit I enjoy a good gimmick every now and then. I especially think the Planescape factions are good for developing a distinctive personality. While he was pretty liberal for a sinker, one of my recent characters was more-or-less Doomguard aligned. While I admit I broke down and metagamed once when my character seemed very likely to meet a grisly end, I had a lot of fun with the interactions between him and the party cleric. I only wish the campaign had lasted long enough for the situation to develop further.

That being said, if you let a gimmick get out of hand, to the point where it starts becoming the only defining feature of the character, you've gone too far. I dropped a PbP character once because I felt he had gotten far too gimmicky, but my fellow players liked his gimmick so much they complained about me dropping him.

Venerable
2008-03-23, 12:58 AM
The group I'm in splits roughly 50/50. Some roleplay more than others; everybody speaks in character sometimes, but no one is in character all the time. I try to err on the "more" side. A side-effect of increased in-character play is a better understanding of my character.

Another player's been posting an in-character journal to the group's wiki. It's been a very good role-playing addition to the game, illuminating what's going on in that character's head. (It helps that the character has a quirky sense of humor, which makes the journal fun to read.)

I'd do this too, but my character shares little with the other characters. So in a weird way, not posting in character is a way of acting in character. (It's also less work. :smallwink:)

Tengu
2008-03-23, 01:51 AM
I don't even understand the point of HNS campaigns where there is no roleplaying and little plot, just killing countless monsters all the time. Isn't it better to play a video game for that?

Dr Bwaa
2008-03-23, 03:47 AM
I don't even understand the point of HNS campaigns where there is no roleplaying and little plot, just killing countless monsters all the time. Isn't it better to play a video game for that?

Some may argue with me, but I think the point is simply that in group interaction, it's more entertaining than having five people in a room playing DOOM 3 on separate PCs. Not that that's not fun =D

Additionally, D&D is inherently creative. I can't imagine even a HNS campaign with no room for great mishaps and other variously entertaining (often PC-created) issues. In Diablo 2, you'll never be fighting the boss along with a bunch of friends and suddenly you go to attack, but you screw up and end up landing in the middle of the Wizard's spell, accidentally teleporting yourself to the Plane of Fire. There's no DM to make up ridiculous consequences for your actions. And in my experience, those are some of the best aspects of HNS campaigns.

nerulean
2008-03-23, 07:49 PM
I've got an amazing group at the moment that's full of some of the best roleplayers I've ever met. Every character in the group, even the guy who normally plays entirely for the statistics, has a rich and realistic personality with genuine motivations, quirks and flaws. It's pretty much the most fun I've ever had in tabletop roleplay.

I have noticed that I'm developing a worrying habit of playing naive, bubbly young characters who love everything and everyone and especially bunnies, though. I should watch that... :smalltongue:

Indon
2008-03-23, 07:56 PM
Depends on how into the character I get. Also, I generally get more into character when I'm playing a PC than when I'm DM'ing... probably something about having to keep track and play a bunch of NPC's versus being able to focus on one guy.

shadow_archmagi
2008-03-23, 07:58 PM
Me and the DM are the only two in my current group who can roleplay worth a damn. Our paladin utterly stinks at it and tends to throw me out of any role-playing mood.

Standard dialgogue from him:
DM: "The peasant asks for his hat back.
Paladin: "I KILL HIM AND HIS FAMILY AND STAB THEIR BLEEDING CORPSES THEN THROW THEIR ENTRAILS OUT THE WINDOW. Just kidding, I guess I tell the peasant he can have his hat back. If he pays me. No, wait, I'm good, I'll give it to him for free."

Glyde
2008-03-23, 07:59 PM
I roleplay no matter what. If other people don't - that's fine - I get bonus XP unless the DM is a dink.

Roleplaying is one of the most enjoyable things I do in life, along with sleeping and writing. And breathing.

nobodylovesyou4
2008-03-23, 08:24 PM
Me and the DM are the only two in my current group who can roleplay worth a damn. Our paladin utterly stinks at it and tends to throw me out of any role-playing mood.

Standard dialgogue from him:
DM: "The peasant asks for his hat back.
Paladin: "I KILL HIM AND HIS FAMILY AND STAB THEIR BLEEDING CORPSES THEN THROW THEIR ENTRAILS OUT THE WINDOW. Just kidding, I guess I tell the peasant he can have his hat back. If he pays me. No, wait, I'm good, I'll give it to him for free."

that doesnt sound so much like roleplaying as it does this guy being an ass. you should probably penalize him when he does that.