NOW LIVE! Today's the day you meet your new best friend. You don’t have to leave Wolfy behind... In 'Pets & Sidekicks' your companions level up with you!

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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Tony Vargas" data-source="post: 6879046" data-attributes="member: 996">And not what we were talking about.  Why bring it up?D&D isn't inspired by RL or comic-book takes on heroism, but by the broader fantasy genre - which includes plenty of action and heroism.Not so much, no, because players are limited in their excesses by both needing to follow the rules, and by the judgment of the DM.  While the DM, ultimately, isn't even restrained by the rules (and in games like 5e is particularly encouraged not to be so).Very true.   The answer to 'why should I struggle to adapt D&D to the 'style' I want?' is often 'because it's the only game in town.'  There are tons of other games in RPG history, some of them even still in print, but none are as easy to find a chance to play(or run) as D&D, particularly the current edition of D&D.Which is a particular issue when the rules frequently punt to the DM for a ruling.  Not saying that a player frustrated with 5e's default feel couldn't get some of the experience they were looking for by DMing, and running a DMPC, just that it's very easy for that to go very badly wrong.Every check in essence calls for a ruling.  That's an intentional design feature that encourages players to be accepting of rulings - a cornerstone of 5e's DM Empowerment.  You can't, and shouldn't, try to evade such responsibility as a DM, but you should rule for the good of the campaign (the story, the players' enjoyment, &c), and running a DMPC can introduce quite a temptation to do otherwise.  Especially if you're running primarily to get a play experience that requires extensive use of modules & house-ruling...They are quite different, certainly, but they are still both RPing, and they are still both fun.  DMing is more of a commitment, more work, and more of a responsibility to your fellow players, but it's that much more rewarding, IMHO, even if sometimes, paradoxically, seemingly thankless.... Ah, yeah.  There's nothing off limits in 5e.  You could change anything/everything.  Just last Sunday, I was in a game (my third time as a player in 5e, and the most enjoyable, BTW), where the DM gave us pregens that had stats on a 1-7 scale (just add your stat to the roll), and no classes, backgrounds, feats or racial abilities (most were human but there was an android and a, I guess spirit, as well), just skills, attacks, and a short list of special abilities unique to each.  Very cool, but barely recognizable.  <img src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f609.png" class="smilie smilie--emoji" loading="lazy" width="64" height="64" alt=";)" title="Wink    ;)"  data-smilie="2"data-shortname=";)" /> A DMPC in a support/side-kick/exposition or similar secondary-character role could be more workable than most.  If you like being the less-plot-central, side-kick (which can be hard to do in most RPGs, because of scrabbling for spotlight time, needing to make a 'balanced' contribution and so forth), that could be a good way to do it.  You'd have to get your RP fix primarily by interacting with the PCs instead of the NPCs.  Aside from that, it sounds like a good formula.  <img src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f642.png" class="smilie smilie--emoji" loading="lazy" width="64" height="64" alt=":)" title="Smile    :)"  data-smilie="1"data-shortname=":)" />Ooh, another possibility.</blockquote>

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