Forcing rules to accomodate character concepts

[Doug McCrae]

I'm very much in favour of drawing inspiration from a wide variety of sources - including fantasy fiction - but ultimately you have to work within the framework you've agreed with the other players. Ie the rules.

 

[Doug McCrae]

We can distinguish three kinds of roleplaying game:

1) Those that primarily try to simulate fiction. Examples: Conan d20, Star Wars, James Bond 007.
2) Those that try to simulate anything. Examples: HERO, GURPS.
3) Those that are not primarily a simulation. D&D is of this type.

 

[Mallus]

- but ultimately you have to work within the framework you've agreed with the other players. Ie the rules.

Do you mean the written rules, or the rules agreed upon by the participants? They're not the same thing.

 

[Hussar]

Do you mean the written rules, or the rules agreed upon by the participants? They're not the same thing.

I think it would be the rules agreed upon by the participants of course. If a group is playing without certain rules, then whatever is written in those rules wouldn't be terribly important to that group.

 

[Dykstrav]

Me? I always prefer to play a character from 1st level. Wandering around the dungeon with 4 hit points and surviving is D&D at it's most fun for me. And then 7 hit points at 2nd level and surviving yet again...and so on. I've never been a fan of starting a campaign at some level above 1st. If approached to play in a campaign with levels higher than first I'll always ask to play one of my previous characters who is retired and at about the same level as the newly rolled up characters.

This is the way I feel too. The war stories are just always so much better. Telling a fellow gamer about the time your 30th-level paladin put the smack down on an entire orc tribe just doesn't have the same impact as the tale about how your 3rd-level wizard scored a lucky crit to kill a dire wolf when he was out of spells with 2 hit points left. Just seems more heroic to risk death when you have fewer resources to fall back on to me.

 

[Dykstrav]

Speaking for myself, low level has become boring. I've been playing D&D for roughly 20yrs now. I know I'm no grognard, but just try to imagine the number of times I've rolled up a level 1 character. Honestly I couldn't put a number to it if I tried, but its been ALOT.

Very rarely have I gotten to play much past 12th level... and its those higher levels that I crave. My longest running D&D character went from 1st to 13th level. In my group's current campaign we started at lvl 11th and are now 13th, and I'm loving it.

Yeah... I'd be hard-pressed to even make a guess at the number of 1st-level characters I've rolled up. Probably murdered several trees in the process though. My own longest running campaign went from 1st level to 22nd. LOTS of fun. I did try starting characters off at 18th level when we did the Throne of Bloodstone and it worked out reasonably well. It is unfortunately true that most games never survive into the double-digit levels, much less epic levels. I've always wanted to play an epic character but never gotten the chance.

 

[fusangite]

Likewise, if I play Conan, I'm not likely going to want to base my character off of Elminister. I'm going to base my concept off of what fits in the Conan universe.

Exactly. Without agreement on a setting, there is no story and, basically, no game. As long as the rules and the setting are closely linked the OP's original problem ceases to be a rules problem and becomes a disagreement over setting.

 

[hong]

We can distinguish three kinds of roleplaying game:

1) Those that primarily try to simulate fiction. Examples: Conan d20, Star Wars, James Bond 007.
2) Those that try to simulate anything. Examples: HERO, GURPS.
3) Those that are not primarily a simulation. D&D is of this type.

Hmm. Where do Exalted, Sorcerer and Dogs in the Vineyard fit in this taxonomy?

 

[Slife]

And, of course, problems also arise when players are inspired by other sources- mythology, for example. D&D simply doesn't have rules for someone who is a descendant of gods or who is otherwise destined to be epic, like Herakles crushing the serpents as a baby, or Achilles's nigh-invulnerability. In both cases, the characters were more powerful than their contemporaries, even in childhood- not an easy thing to reflect in D&D.

They're demigods, nyet? So it's perfectly reasonable to give them divine rank 0. This in turn grants:

Immortality
Max HP per Hit dice
CHA to AC
Dr 10/epic
Fire resistance 5
Spell resistance 32
Immunity to mind-effecting effects, Energy Drain, Ability Drain, Ability Damage, petrification, , polymorphing or any other form-altering attack (although you can still change your own form)
60 ft land speed.

 

[Hussar]

They're demigods, nyet? So it's perfectly reasonable to give them divine rank 0. This in turn grants:

Immortality
Max HP per Hit dice
CHA to AC
Dr 10/epic
Fire resistance 5
Spell resistance 32
Immunity to mind-effecting effects, Energy Drain, Ability Drain, Ability Damage, petrification, , polymorphing or any other form-altering attack (although you can still change your own form)
60 ft land speed.

And what would be the level adjustment for that little monstrosity?