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RPG Evolution: Playing Your PC Poorly
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<blockquote data-quote="Oofta" data-source="post: 8586576" data-attributes="member: 6801845"><p>I've enjoyed play sub-optimal PCs in the past. The (pre Tasha's) dwarven wizard, the rogue that had a higher strength than dexterity and so on. For other PCs it's been the reasonable intelligence low wisdom PC that makes snap decisions such as charging head long into battle. I had a lot of fun with a barbarian that thought lying and deception was a weakness.</p><p></p><p>There are various ways of creating character "hooks", things to play off of that make the PC more interesting to me. I try not to take it to the extreme of course, I just think that flaws can be just as fun as strengths. I wouldn't totally nerf a character because I want to contribute to the team.</p><p></p><p>Optimization in 5E is frequently in the eye of the beholder and comes down to the "best" build adding a point or two of DPR while ignoring everything else. Speaking from experience, in 3.5 there could a huge difference between optimal builds and non-optimal builds. Even though I was never one to seek out exploits, at certain levels some of my PCs could out-damage the rest of the group combined until around 15th level when nobody could compete with a competent caster. I just don't see that level of difference in 5E, so playing someone not optimized doesn't make that much of a difference. Tactics, teamplay and luck are more important most of the time.</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="Oofta, post: 8586576, member: 6801845"] I've enjoyed play sub-optimal PCs in the past. The (pre Tasha's) dwarven wizard, the rogue that had a higher strength than dexterity and so on. For other PCs it's been the reasonable intelligence low wisdom PC that makes snap decisions such as charging head long into battle. I had a lot of fun with a barbarian that thought lying and deception was a weakness. There are various ways of creating character "hooks", things to play off of that make the PC more interesting to me. I try not to take it to the extreme of course, I just think that flaws can be just as fun as strengths. I wouldn't totally nerf a character because I want to contribute to the team. Optimization in 5E is frequently in the eye of the beholder and comes down to the "best" build adding a point or two of DPR while ignoring everything else. Speaking from experience, in 3.5 there could a huge difference between optimal builds and non-optimal builds. Even though I was never one to seek out exploits, at certain levels some of my PCs could out-damage the rest of the group combined until around 15th level when nobody could compete with a competent caster. I just don't see that level of difference in 5E, so playing someone not optimized doesn't make that much of a difference. Tactics, teamplay and luck are more important most of the time. [/QUOTE]
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