Party Roles

[moritheil]

Let me expand on what I said earlier. If everyone wants to play the same thing, or take the same role within a group, what methods do people use to settle these disputes? Should the DM get involved in settling them?

 

[Aeric]

A variant of the Jokester is the Troublemaker. This is the character who tries to steal from the party, or goes off on his own in town or the dungeon and gets himself in a fix, or makes stupid decisions on purpose that ruin the party's plans or otherwise makes things more difficult than they need to be. Troublemakers invariably leave the party (alive or otherwise) before too long, but new Troublemakers always seem to crop up.

 

[MonsterMash]

Do you find the same players end up in the same roles or does it rotate fairly regularly?

I think that you tend to find similar roles evolving with groups outside of gaming, from what I remember of social psychology there will be social and emotional leaders, outsiders, etc. I'll try and find a ref and post a link here.

I can certainly identify some of these roles with the way that characters play in my game groups.