What do you try and achieve with your character?

[Sadrik]

What kind of character do you enjoy playing and building the most.

Outside the box character:
You play characters against their type, whether mechanically like a melee wizard or a barbarian archer or you play the odd personality like a pacifist adventurer or perhaps you pick that odd prestige/paragon path that no one has heard of.

Tried and true character:
You play the grumpy dwarf, the flighty elf, or the wise wizard personality, or mechanically you play a fighter that will best in that role ever without deviation. Clerics heal and I do that, period. Anything outside of normal is either not efficient, too much work, or too weird.

 

[Crothian]

My characters tend to go against type in interesting and different ways. But rarely mechancially like you have.

 

[Umbran]

What kind of character do you enjoy playing and building the most.

Neither of the kinds you list, specifically.

I build a character to explore themes I haven't touched on, to generate interesting interactions with other PCs and NPCs, and to fill "holes" in the party's skill profiles, among other things.

Just being "in-type" or "against-type" is not a design goal for me.

 

[drothgery]

Hmm... I generally try for race / class combos that are fairly sound mechanically, and don't try to make a class into something it's not (ala a melee wizard). But I've mostly been playing new-for-4e classes lately; my last two characters have been a half-elf warlord and a human swordmage.

 

[Set]

I almost never play a character *mechanically* against type, but I do often choose something less common to the region, because the local choices might not appeal to me much.

I'm not the sort to play a Halfling Monk 'just to be different.'

I am the sort to play a Dwarven Cleric of the wargod with spiked armor, spiked shield and spiked holy water, just to be different.

 

[amysrevenge]

I play exclusively RPGA games, which leads to playing many characters. I play a nice mix of typical and atypical characters.

Now, I'm generally as shallow as the next powergamer, and I love my optimized warforged barbarian to pieces. However, I find that I get a special kick out of taking a soundly non-optimal starting point (warforged wizard for instance, or gnome barbarian, or dwarf rogue) and producing a wickedly effective character from that initial handicap.

 

[BlightCrawler]

Outside the box character: You play characters against their type, like a melee wizard or a barbarian archer or you play the pacifist adventurer or you pick that odd prestige/paragon path that no one has heard of.

Tried and true character: You play the grumpy dwarf, if you play a fighter it is the one that will best in that role ever. Clerics heal and I do that. Anything outside of normal is either not efficient, too much work, or too weird.

The problem I think with the poll is that your first example is all about character mechanics, while your latter example is partially about the personality and partially about mechanics.

And it gets even wonkier when you take it out of d20. Like what does outside the box and tried and true mean for Primetime Adventures or Spirit of the Century?

 

[darjr]

My kid has shown me the light as far as out of the box characters.

He once made a GURPS Buck Rogers character that was a mutant plant and had an epic level skill in gardening. When we crossed paths with an alien giant super genius plant it came in real handy.

His favorite RPGA character is his first 4e one, a Dragonborn Wizard that thinks he is an elf and has earned the honor of the elves to be recognized as one. His wizard has a skull familiar that communicates through the eight ball fortune teller devices in his eye sockets.

 

[Mallus]

As a rule, I enjoy playing against fictional type and don't have much interest --anymore-- in playing against mechanical type. I like characters that are competent at what they do and slightly off-the-wall in what they choose to do.

My current 4e PC is, mechanically-speaking, a balanced CHA/STR Dragonborn paladin. But more importantly, he's something of a cross between Don Quixote and Peter Pan who is making a name for himself writing brutal musical theater and highly-eroticized labor propaganda (thanks to his inability to grasp non-Dragonborn notions of propriety).

The PC I'm working on for an upcoming urban fantasy M&M2e campaign is a cross between Dr. Strange, Richard Feynman, and Frank Booth (from Blue Velvet). A sorcerer who commits horrible depraved acts so he can no longer face himself, and thus, in a state of non-observance, wield quantum mechanics-based magic.

I'm only interested in mechanical abilities insofar as they help me create an interesting and amusing fictional character.

 

[Sadrik]

The problem I think with the poll is that your first example is all about character mechanics, while your latter example is partially about the personality and partially about mechanics.

Not my intent, mechanical or personality. I edited the first post to make it more clear.

I personally like playing against type:
I like playing the strong 1/2 orc sorcerer
or the sickly fighter

Granted to play these concepts I have to bear out some mechanical reason for doing so as well. I can't just have a suboptimal character for the sake of having a suboptimal character. I need it to be contributing to the group as well.