Players: Do your characters need to be kewl?

The Shaman said:

It's only a "problem" if you won't or can't generalize a bit for the sake of an informal poll on an interweb fansite.

Click to expand...

I find myself unable to.

On one hand my current PC (I've only ever in my life had two) works for the town guard, lives in a small appartment provided by his church, and has about 130 gold to his name that he has to stretch to make ends meet. On the other hand, he escaped from the Blood War in Acheron with an cursed artifact (getting benefits but with consequences attached) and is quickly moving up the political ladder more easily than others around him. He actively looks for adventure, and being a Paladin is very concerned with smiting Evil and helping innocents.

He seems to have strong aspects of both sides. And, this DM likes characters who are destined for greatness (as seen in the last and only campaign he's ever run), so in a metagame sense I know that at some point that will come into play.

I wish a "both" option were present.

Aspects of 'kewl' characters that are particular obstacles to cooperative play are
-- characters with weird and different backgrounds or races as a substitute for being interesting characters
-- character 'builds' worked out in advance, so the character plods on like a psychopath unaffected by the events of the campaign
-- characters who hog glory at the expense of others
-- psychopathic loners without family

I don't think you can group those things together with characters who develop heroic traits as they overcome terrible obstacles. Cool or kewl, as I understand it, is selfish, glib, superficial glamour.

I like playing interesting characters -- I won't play a character that bores me. I tend to come up with backgrounds bordering on fantastic, and have done some silly stuff (my half-fire elemental with the Blood War backstory -- in his defense, he started at level 10, so I couldn't have been farming (while on fire) for ten levels). Some of my characters are "everyman," I guess, and some are "cool."

What I don't like is how "kewl" is used here, as if every character that's not an Everyman like Bilbo Baggins or book one Rand al'Thor or Frodo is inferior, just for that reason. I don't know if that's what was being insinuated. I can't read minds. I just don't like how it seems like one response is correct, and one is not. It bugs me.

I also don't know how to define it. Whizbang, assuming you're a Warcraft fan like your avatar makes me believe -- under what category does Arthas fall? Jaina? Brann? Illidan? Are they all "kewl?"

Man, that word goes right through me. What I'm saying is, pretty much, I think I'm interpretating the question incorrectly, and would like a little elaboration, if possible.