Character Philosophies

redwing · May 1, 2005

After watching the movie King Arthur I was intrigued by the concept of a personal philosophy or ideal as a motivation for adventuring. Even though it was forced, the ideal of free will was a unique twist for the character. What philosophies have you used for your characters?

Nifft · May 1, 2005

Elf Cleric of Odin (and the Norse pantheon in general), in RttToEE, and his goals are:

1/ Spread of the Norse pantheon, conversion of worshippers of false gods, destruction of temples, etc.
2/ Defeat evil Giant-spawn (magical beasts, aberrations, and of course giants) wherever found; and
3/ Improvement of the Human race by fathering many half-elves. (Priestly motto: "Don't call me Father... call me Daddy.")

-- N

PS: Is that what you meant?

Elf Witch · May 1, 2005

In one game I played in I had a character who tried not to kill and belived in redemption so she tried to give our enemies a chance to change. Much to the rest of the party's displeasure.

Sometimes it worked and sometimes it didn't. But the world we played in was not a black and white world where our enemies were always evil.

She was a fun character to play.

Errant · May 1, 2005

My current (Eberron) PC is a Cleric5/Paladin2 of the Silver Flame who believes mercy is a virtue. Its starting to wear on the other players when he cries "Surrender of die!" every chance he gets. When they do surrender he generally has some hireling guardsmen around to cart prisoners off to the local authorities so that helps.

If they don't surrender, well, if they choose to fight to the death so be it.

I'm A Banana · May 2, 2005

I play in Planescape so.....all of them.

Torm · May 2, 2005

I ran a Paladin of Mystra whose motivations were the promotion and protection of the causes of Mystra and Magic. He regarded Shar and Gond as the biggest threats to his Mistress. Other members of the party were always looking at him sideways, though, because he had no problem making deals with liches (necromancy, after all, is a school of magic) and after a few Banites ended up fighting at his side and dying when all were stuck in a dungeon, he stopped and made an offering at a Temple of Bane in their name. Caused quite a stir among the priests of Bane that were there.

mhacdebhandia · May 2, 2005

In Hong's campaign my last character only developed a personal philosophy as a reaction to having his moral and ethical crutch taken away. He had always followed the example and lifestyle of his (NPC) wife, who had led him into his career as a witch hunter, but when she fell into evil through self-sacrifice (she gave herself over to the blood mages in an attempt to save innocents they threatened), his worldview was shattered because it had always depended upon her example.

As a result he became a very odd kind of puritan - a moral absolutist in a very callous way who made "Don't sink to their level" his mantra. The only thing he had left to him was to be the perfectly moral person he thought his wife had been, and in doing so he lost all compassion and feeling. It was pretty entertaining.

FreeTheSlaves · May 2, 2005

Simple motivations I'm afraid:

My PC)
To save money to buy land for betroved (& family). He needs to complete 3 year duty to King, God and Kingdom by upholding law and carrying out justice in frontier province. He intends to retire to become peaceful landed Gentry eventually, so in this respect he has family ambitions.

****

Pet NPC1)
Similar to the above but he has achieved his estate but with rampant lawlessness and with a depressed economic outlook for the foreseeable future he has taken to selling his services to improve his peoples lot (feudal lord). Only problem is that his service is transmuting man and beast into 'Chimerae' for secretive and wealthy dark Dwarves. He must keep this secret from his family and people at all costs to maintain their contentment as well as prosperity but although he uses those captured bandits that detect as evil, his emotional state is straining.

Pet NPC2)
A child of civil war grown up into a fiercesome knight-commander of a Duke. His lord, fearing his incredible prowess, orchastrated his demise after he killed his Lord's principle enemy, but didn't guard against his lover aquiring a holy scroll of raise the dead. She is caught & killed, but too late the Knight-Lord (after recovering) wrecks terrible vengeance with sword & torch and flees the province under pursuit. At this point he enters the PC's kingdom and is torn by his dual nature: needs to serve a just Lord but feels he can no longer trust authority figures.