Beauty in D&D

[RangerWickett]

Claudio, I'm glad an artist such as yourself came by. I love good illustrations, especially of my characters. I'm kinda sad that my old girlfriend (a comic artist) doesn't live around here anymore, because I used to always get illos of characters in the games.

Gamers, would you spend a few bucks commissioning an artist to illustrate a favorite character of yours? I've done this, but to be fair I was also filling out art needs of a book I was working on. Still, it was cool to see famous figures of my campaign brought to life. What about everyone else?

 

[LeifVignirsson]

Beauty Pagent... What a wonderful idea...

The most rediculously insanely beuatiful people have something wrong with them in the head. The one that had the only 18 CHA in the group is plotting to become a lich.

As a rule of thumb though, I use the old, old OLD article they had in DRAGON from YEARS ago that tied in CHA, CON and INT to determine the "real looks". If I remember correctly, the higher the CHA and INT score, the better spoken and clearer voice one has while the higher the CHA and CON score, the better shape the person appeared to be in.

Hmmm, I am going to have to find that article again so I can have it handy for next game...

 

[yennico]

In old ad&d times a female gamer played a female necromancer with cha 18.
She often wore some bone armor. Later we discovered some pictures from Royo.

 

[Mercule]

IMC, charisma and beauty are independent of one another. You are as attractive as you say you are. It's like Hollywood, where everyone is pretty.

If your charisma sucks, then you can still be "hot", you just get no respect. People don't really like you, they just give pillow talk. Or they avoid you because you've got an annoying voice. Or, just because you look like a Playboy pin-up doesn't mean you don't pick your nose and eat it while talking to people.

In the 1E DMG, Gygax had a list of not-so-hot people who had an 18 charisma. Hitler, Churchill, and Napoleon were on there, IIRC. You can be ugly as sin, but still able to sway people's opinions.

 

[Arnwyn]

How do you handle beauty in your games? Do you just tie it to charisma? Do you ignore it?

Yeah, we just tie it into charisma. Good enough for us.

Do you play to the classic images of gorgeous sorceresses and muscle-bound barbarians?

Yep, we sure do. We love the stereotypes and cliches. Our group is all about that.

Would you ever allow a chainmail bikini in your game?

I thought that's what all the chain shirts for Cha 14+ females were...? (The answer is a theoretical 'yes' for our group...)

Who's the prettiest PC in the party?

In our group, it's a tie between the paladin and swashbuckler.

 

[Rystil Arden]

I've actually had a beauty pageant for women in one of my campaigns at the Jousting Tournament so that there was something the ladies could do (that particular setting did not allow them to be knights). The greedy 18 Charisma knight who wanted to win more prizes managed to convince his friend the Swashbuckler to lend him some magic berries he had swiped off a witch (for pranks) that transmuted males to females.

So the knight-turned-girl wound up winning third prize.

In my main campaign, the Wild Elf Frenzied Berserker is the prettiest because he has the most Charisma (28), with the Nymph Shaman (26), Nymph Archmage (26) and the Half-Nymph/Half-Wildelf [too many different classes] (26) close behind.

Also, the Wild Elf has the Girdle of De Rah...

 

[Darth K'Trava]

physical beauty is charisma based.

but not all beings go for just looks.

charisma is also persuasiveness.

and presence. poise.

high cha means you get noticed.

Especially by those of the opposite gender.... We have one group who all have 24 or so CHA scores... Makes ya wonder just how "hot-looking" a 24 CHA female half dragon paladin is.... The rest are human, she's the only exception.

And a vote of HELL NO for chainmail bikinis. It doesn't matter how sexy one is in one of those things, it's still AC 10... (according to my gaming buddies... )

Nothing can beat that one party bathing in a lake together.... Male and female both in the same lake at the same time!

 

[madelf]

Would you ever allow a chainmail bikini in your game?

At one point this was the portrait used for my wife's character in a D&D game.

I think beauty in the game should be decided by how good the character portrait looks.
What?

 

[boredgremlin]

Claudio, I'm glad an artist such as yourself came by. I love good illustrations, especially of my characters. I'm kinda sad that my old girlfriend (a comic artist) doesn't live around here anymore, because I used to always get illos of characters in the games.

Gamers, would you spend a few bucks commissioning an artist to illustrate a favorite character of yours? I've done this, but to be fair I was also filling out art needs of a book I was working on. Still, it was cool to see famous figures of my campaign brought to life. What about everyone else?

I might consider it. Depending on the cost of course. Nothing rediculous but if it was on the level of buying yet one more supplemental book i dont need or two for the same price, i would go for the art any day.

Lol and i figure attractiveness to be a combination of all 3 characteristics. If you have a high strenth, low con, low chr person then he is probably a strong but chubby guy with a bad attitude, the low con could also make him a body builder type who never does cardio and has a smug attitude. Phsyical attractiveness is too subjective. Some girls like body builders and others like goth guys. Some guys like tall no chest model types, others like shorter girls who are stacked. Lol then you have the chubby chasers. There just isnt really an ideal model of beauty. Then you have to figure other races. Say you have an orc with a high comeliness. Does that mean the humans and elves are falling all over her? Somehow i find it unlikely that orcs would find the same traits appealing as we do. So is this orc super model hot to humans, or to orcs? It just doesnt really work.

 

[Hammerhead]

Well, in the current group, we have:

a Half-Orc with a 6 Charisma and a 20 Str and high Dex and Con. This guy probably has a great body, but is horribly ugly.

a Half-Dragon; he's not so much ugly as alien in appearance.

a Human sorcerer who looks, acts, and sounds like Clint Eastwood. Most people wouldn't consider Eastwood to be that handsome, despite his super high Charisma.

a Human cleric who's probably pretty good looking; dark skin and curly black hair, with a high Charisma.

the best looking character in our party is the Half-Celestial Paladin, who's ridiculously good looking, has the highest Charisma, etc.

In our group, appearance for human-type characters tends to follow Charisma, although not always.