D&D 5E (2014) [POLL] Too many concepts, not enough games!

[Sacrosanct]

Just getting an idea from others where you sit on the spectrum of wanting to play X amount of PC concepts compared to your actual game play. Do you play often enough that you get a chance to try out all the concepts you want for PCs, or do you have a list of PC concepts you want to try out, but don't have enough play time to see how they work?

For clarity, concept: either a mechanical build concept, or a role-playing fluff concept, and everything in between.

For example, the following are concepts I really want to try out, but as I DM often, have no idea when I'll be able to try them:

Dragonborn warlock of the deep
half orc hexblade/fighter
Ice sorcerer
Polearm fighter

 

[MNblockhead]

I almost exclusively DM. When I play it is usually at a convention where I'm often using pregens.

 

[DND_Reborn]

I rarely play as well, the current group I am in is the first time someone else is the primary DM and even another player is running CoS from time to time to give the DM a break. I'm next in the DMing rotation.

But, we because we only play every-other-week, and our game has been a real campaign (nearing 18 months with the same characters), there are a lot of concepts I'll probably never get to play.

 

[Harzel]

I'm a little unclear what the difference between the last two choices is; the next-to-last seems to subsume the last.

 

[Shiroiken]

I went with other, because while I have plenty of gaming time, I don't have enough campaigns! Unless a character perma-dies (uncommon) or I retire a character for reasons, I'm playing 1 character for several months, and sometimes even years. This leaves me with various concepts that I don't really get to try out, except for the periodic one-shot adventures between campaigns.

Something I did for a campaign to solve this problem for my players, was to create what I called a Grey Marches campaign (West Marches style based in Greyhawk). Each player was allowed to have multiple characters, but only the active character got XP. If we were ever short on players, I'd let a player use a secondary character, who'd only earn half XP. This let the players try out a TON of ideas, and the ones they enjoyed the most got played the most. Unfortunately, I had to take a break from DMing for a while, during which Ghosts of Saltmarsh came out, and I really wanted to run that rather than return to the prior campaign.

 

[The Green Hermit]

I do have a PC as well as being the DM, but many of the interesting character concepts I came up with wouldn't be able to used to their full potential -- inside knowledge and all of that.

 

[Sacrosanct]

I'm a little unclear what the difference between the last two choices is; the next-to-last seems to subsume the last.

The first is that you play the game, but never get to play the characters for whatever reason. The second is for those who don’t even play the game.

 

[Lakesidefantasy]

Most of the concepts I want, I actually get to play.

I don't spend much time coming up with concepts, and my characters often die or retire.

 

[Legatus Legionis]

.

 

[DEFCON 1]

I don't really have any concepts I want to play, because my concepts almost always come out of the setting & story of the game itself. I want to know what the game is about, where it takes place, who and what are the important story points of the campaign... and only then will I begin to conceptualize a character that can fit into it. I'm not going to waste my time coming up with some bizarro-world character concept beforehand, only to find out there was absolutely no logical way this character would ever come out of the situation the game is going to be set. And I'm most especially not going to screw over my DMs world by asking/demanding that I be allowed to play this character that makes no sense. It's lame on my part, and it'll end up being a lame character in the end anyway.