Do you plan out your character's advancement in advance?

[Nifft]

Usually I do, but right now I've got two PCs (one Saga Jedi and one Cloistered Cleric) who each have several paths of advancement before them, including just staying single-classed.

I'm unsure which direction they'll eventually take. Does merely knowing all of one's options count as planned?

Cheers, -- N

 

[DragonLancer]

I voted rarely simply on the grounds that I pencil it out a level in advance but don't fix it in stone.

It comes from a personal bugbear of mine from a time when I had a serious powergamer in my group. He would create a character and stat him out for an entire 20th level progression before play even began. He would stick to that regardless of what twists and turns occured during the game, and it seriously irked me.

 

[Crothian]

Rarely to never. And when I do it is only for a level or three. I like the advancement iof the character to reflect what is going on in the campaign.

 

[Merkuri]

I like my characters to progress organically, and generally don't plan further than a few choices ahead. I think I stopped trying to plan far ahead during the WLD where people were losing characters left and right. My first character, the one I had grand plans for, and even had a PrC picked out at first level, died after three sessions and made the first death in the WLD. My second character, whose advancement I didn't think about until it came time to level, was the longest lived character in The Dungeon (52 sessions... that's a whole year!).

I had a character in a game before the WLD who experienced a few traumatic events in a row (a demonic scorpion literally reduced one of our party into a fine mist, then we found an old party member... in the form of a pair of boots) and I determined on the spot that she could no longer take levels in cleric. She was one of the best characters I played in terms of not being an extension of myself. She certainly had her own personality completely separate from mine, and I enjoyed seeing where she would go. I couldn't plan anything out because the choices she made were usually a complete surprise to me.

 

[Jedi_Solo]

When I build a character I (almost) always have an idea where I am headed with it. Sometimes I have a D&D character plotted out for 20 levels, sometimes only two or three.

The character doens't always end up following that track and ends up taking feats, classes, skills that I hadn't planned on. The map is always drawn - I might not always follow it.

 

[Blue]

Depends on which game I'm playing in. I really dislike PrCs that need a bunch of feats, some which aren't things you'd pick up anyway. Because if in character it turns out that I want to go down that road, if I need to pick up two feats I'm 4-6 levels away from fulfilling prerequisites until I can start. And that's a long time.

(Mind you, the need for such "sub optimal feats" for balance is a different story. I'm talking just about the effect it has in making me want ot plan ahead for my character.)

Heck, I remember taking ranger because a PrC I would like *IF* I happened to find the secret organization it was part of and get invited to join, because it required Favored Enemy. How silly. (Harper Paragon in the FR.)

So in one game where advancement is fairly quick and we'll probably play to mid-high or even epic, I do work it out. Now, I don't take "Level 20" as some holy grail - maybe I stat out until 16th (my current character), maybe I think through near epic.

In other games, I just play it by ear. Whatever makes sense for the character at the time. It ends up being a lot more organic, and usually less powerful. Still very fun, just a different focus.

Cheers,
=Blue(23)

 

[Angel Tarragon]

Rarely to never. And when I do it is only for a level or three. I like the advancement iof the character to reflect what is going on in the campaign.

QFT. Thats almost exactly what I do.

 

[Theron]

Rarely. I usually have a general idea for what I want to do at the next level, but I've played in so many short-lived campaigns throughout my gaming career, the notion of actually seeing a character through the advancement process is still something of a novelty. A pleasant novelty, but a novelty nonetheless.

Also, for some reason, I still really like playing relatively "pure" character types. My current stable consists of a Fighter, a Bard, and a Paladin, with no plans for any of them to shift into a PrC anytime soon.

 

[Hussar]

All the way to 20th? Not so much. But, I've got a pretty decent idea of the next half dozen levels or so. Not marked in stone of course, since there can always be changes, but, I've got a pretty decent idea of the direction my character is going to take.

 

[Halivar]

I only plan far enough to get the prestige class I want. Then, as I take the prestige class to its utter conclusion, I plan what I'm taking the for last four levels after that.