Obviously the first. The second is a pernicious myth that contributes to “hustle culture” and other societal ills.This is why I prefer a nice binary.
Anyway, what do folks think is the more important lesson to impart?
1. Some people are just born special.
2. With effort, you can make yourself into whatever you want.
I mean, I generally prefer my PCs to be experienced people at the start of a campaign, though usually thrust into a new situation. Think Leverage, Star Trek (at least TOS, TNG, DS9, VOY, ENT, Discovery), Babylon 5, Dark Matter, Farscape, the Expanse, the non-hobbit half of the Fellowship in Lord of the Rings, and so on. I'm perfectly fine with starting on the "Hero" side of the "Zero to Hero" scale.An alternative way to ask this question is to ask when a PC should be considered exceptional.
- At the time of character creation. PCs are inherently special. (e.g. most PbtA, most superhero games)
- Not at the very beginning (Level 1), but reasonably quickly after they've been around the block a couple of times (Level 7ish). (e.g. D&D 5E).
- Not until they've done some serious growth and powered up a lot (Level 15ish). (e.g. D&D 3E, most WEG d6 games)
I want to roleplay something different from my normal experience. That's why I like to play average Joes.I mean, they son’t HAVE to be exceptional, but I’ve never met a person IRL who didn’t want to play as someone special.
Yeah but IME the PCs with higher stats end up protecting your lil underdog. Higher stats > lower statsBoth at once.
And it's done by having randomly-generated stats - those who are "born special" have higher stats across the board than the average and quite possibly higher stats then their PC peers.
And then the "make something out of it" piece comes in. You can have the highest stats you want but if you die in your second combat then they didn't matter much, did they? Meanwhile, the underdog PC who started with very bland stats might just keep chuggin' along and make himself into something quite special indeed.
... or victory. And there's a better shot at victory with better stats. Statistically-speakingThe old classic. High stats lead to overconfidence, lead to death.
Of course, my problem is that D&D when I started playing it was more sword & sorcery and less high fantasy, and I still prefer to play my D&D-like games that way, so the whole "D&D is high fantasy" thing has never sit right with me.With regards to "what's considered exceptional..." IMO most editions' DnD characters are, to varying degrees, exceptional. They advance in power quickly, they outperform their contemporaries, and in dnd5e they punch way above their weight class.
SHOULD they be exceptional? Tough call. Depends on the game ofc, but I feel like they have to be a little above average at least to give the PCs a fighting chance... above table, the PCs only experience the world maybe 1/week, so they could use the benefit of the doubt. I think even Call of Cthulhu characters are a little exceptional in one way or another, in that they're a little more capable than Average Joe.
In a high fantasy game like DnD yeah, they should be. HOW exceptional is up for debate, ofc.
In a Sword & Sorcery game, well Fafhrd and the Grey Mouser were certainly best in their class- as was Conan.