What is a character to you?

[Tilenas]

The whole "What I want from 5e" and recent Legends & Lore discussion revolved a lot around player challenges vs. character challenges. Some folks believe that characters are but a proxy or a puppet that inhabits the game world in their stead, while others try to make the game all about the characters.

The divide becomes apparent in the discussion of the skill system proposed by Monte Cook. Some argue that good player ideas should result in a bonus for their characters' checks, while others want them to auto-succeed.
Another line of reasoning is that if a player likes to role-play a certain aspect of the game, he cannot optimize his character toward that particular end, as that character is going to auto-succeed on most tasks, while a merely moderately gifted character would rely on player input, and thus role-play, to succeed.

Myself, I am all for character challenges. I don't exist in the game world.
That's of course true in combat. If your player is a big guy who is a martial arts champion, but plays a meek little rogue, he wouldn't make his character charge at the minotaur and try to beat it to pulp with his bare hands, nor would he be mad at the DM if he tried and failed.

From the actual role-playing perspective, you get the same result, even without any involvement of game mechanics. Ideally, the character you play is someone other than yourself. And luckily, that's how it's usually done: people play characters that have different outlooks and opinions from their own.
I am a lawful guy, obedient to a fault towards those I consider to be an authority, but also punctual and reliable. If my next character is a CN priest of Xhaos or whatever, and the other PCs want to make a plan, he'd go "screw you guys. Why, you ask? F*** you, that's why!", because he doesn't make plans, he just does. Granted, if my player and character views come into conflict, I will express my character's view, but often be secretly glad if he is overruled by the majority.

What I don't get is that while your character is (or should be) completely independent of the player both in combat and in interacting with the game world, why should he have the same logical and perceptive capabilities as the player?

We all know that playing a stupid character is sometimes hard and often frustrating, but playing a character who's smarter than the player is downright impossible without some aid from the game system or DM. It strikes me as being inconsistent (which might be okay of you, btw) to say that a character is a different person in combat, but pretty much like the player when it comes to solving riddles and finding clues.

 

[Corathon]

You decide what your PC does, even in combat. If you use smart tactics, its likely to work out better for the character than if you use dumb ones. Player intellect is always important. Its just a question of where to draw the line.

Personally, if I'm playing a Big, Dumb Guy I will generally not contribute to attempts to solve puzzles or the like, for RP reasons. If I have a PC with a decent INT I'll feel free to use my own brain to try to solve the puzzle - and wouldn't want to roll a die for my character to figure it out. What's the point of the puzzle then?

Also, solving some things (like riddles) takes lateral thinking, which doesn't necessarily correspond exactly to the ability to think clearly and remember well (i.e. to high INT). Smart people are more likely to be good at riddles and puzzles, but its not a guarantee. For me that's a sufficient fig leaf to let player brainpower be what matters.

 

[Traveon Wyvernspur]

I like playing my character the way I envision him to be. If he's a smart-a$$ wizard or a big dumb-a$$ barbarian I play it that way. I pick skills/feats/etc that would help my character to become better versed in the things that I want to be able to do. I like to pick schticks that help with comedic relief and that help me get "into character" more so that I can better visualize what's going on and what I'd like to see happen in the flow of the game. As both a DM and Player, I also enjoy backstories that can help with individuals getting the "spot light" from time to time.

There is a fine line in gaming for meta-gaming and I don't mind having to roll the dice to see if I can figure something out in-character as opposed to out of character. Most of us have been playing long enough to know the strengths and weaknesses of various monsters (i.e. trolls weak to fire), but have to remember that our characters that we are playing have never encountered these beasts before and wouldn't know a lot of these things.

 

[LostSoul]

Characters don't exist, only players. The difference between challenging the player vs. challenging the character is probably better defined in terms of decisions the players make. What kinds of decisions does the game ask you to make? For example: Do you need to decide how to search the desk, or do you need to decide where to allocate skill points and if you should roll, Take 10, or Take 20?

In other words, what is the game about?

 

[howandwhy99]

It has to do with what each player wants out of the game. Some want to play the game as a reality puzzle, others want to play the game as a theater performance.

Character portrayal is going on no matter what because players are dealing with a fictional environment. However, character portrayal is not always the reason why many players are playing.

Take videogames as an example. There are players who come to those games to use the avatar as a puppet to tell a story. They talk in character and typically only select RP worlds. But IME it is far more common for online games to be played to raise skills, collect resources, and increase overall power levels.

Treating a PC in an RPG as an avatar of one's self where certain physical acts aren't performed, but many mental acts are does not make one a bad roleplayer. It's simply approaching the game from another point of view, that of a puzzle solver.

Let me try another example. When you pull up a word processing program or Photoshop on a computer you are probably attempting to tell a story or create an artwork. But when you pull up Solitaire or play Chess against the computer do you treat them as a scribing tool to tell your story or an art palette to create your art? Or are you attempting to puzzle out what you perceive to reach an objective you've decided on?

Different games like different software programs can be designed to support different approaches and different kinds of fun. There is no right or better way here; it is simply different players with different preferences. And heck, no one's saying people can't or shouldn't take whatever approach they desire. So try different approaches and see what you want. Not every game is for every customer, but not every game is designed to support every style of play too.

 

[ExploderWizard]

Characters don't exist, only players. The difference between challenging the player vs. challenging the character is probably better defined in terms of decisions the players make. What kinds of decisions does the game ask you to make? For example: Do you need to decide how to search the desk, or do you need to decide where to allocate skill points and if you should roll, Take 10, or Take 20?

In other words, what is the game about?

I gotta spread some around....


The first sentence here is vitally important. The game is all about the people playing it because they are the ones investing time in an activity they expect to be fun.

It really depends on what the individuals find fun. If the game is a challenge only for the character (a collected pile of data) what excitement and engagement is there for the player. In theory anyone could run that character and deal with the challenges exactly the same way. The character succeeds in combat. The character discovers a vital clue. The character outwits a clever villain. Where is the sense of involvement for someone (such as a person) in all this?

 

[steenan]

My relation to my character strongly depends on the game I play. I enjoy many different play styles, so the stance I use differs, too.

That being said, rarely if ever I "am my character" totally. Even when I play with deep immersion, there still is some awareness of OOG matters and it affects my choices (at least a little). And on the other end of this spectrum, I never play is completely disconnected way, treating my character as a pawn, with no personality and no consistency in their choices.

But between those points there is a lot of space. Sometimes, there is strong identification with the character in the sense that what matters to me is what they perceive, feel, choose, do. Sometimes, the character is a part of the story I tell, so my input on the context and results of actions matter as much as the actions themselves.

But the stance is not the only determining factor on what I expect from game mechanics. The general focus of the game is as important.

If I want to focus on exploration, that is what I spend my time and mental energy on. That is where my decisions are important. I want my input to be the crucial part in deciding what I find and what dangers I bring upon myself. There may be no rolls for this, or the rolls being only a small factor. On the other hand, in such a game combat situations may be resolved by a single roll, with no more tactics than "I try to kill it", "I run" or "I delay it until my friends open the door".

If the game focuses on something else entirely, then searching for things is a detail. I don't want to waste time on something that is not important; searching does not need my attention and my choices. I'll gladly delegate it to a roll, with no need of any special modifiers.

In general, trying to focus on everything is a bad idea. It takes a lot of time and is neither engaging nor interesting. In my gaming group, we decide what we are, at a given time, most interested in and choose an appropriate game for this. Such a game lets us focus our attention and choices on the important matters, while handling the rest quickly and with no hassle.

 

[Tilenas]

You decide what your PC does, even in combat. If you use smart tactics, its likely to work out better for the character than if you use dumb ones. Player intellect is always important. Its just a question of where to draw the line.

That's probably the most common way of looking at it, the tactical wargame approach. In RPGs however, it bothers me that players take forever asking questions about all the details of the locale which their characters would never figure out in one single round. As a player, I try to pay attention to what everyone else does, and when it's my turn I make my move quickly, and restrict myself to tactics my character has a chance to actually come up with.

Characters don't exist, only players. The difference between challenging the player vs. challenging the character is probably better defined in terms of decisions the players make. What kinds of decisions does the game ask you to make? For example: Do you need to decide how to search the desk, or do you need to decide where to allocate skill points and if you should roll, Take 10, or Take 20?

In other words, what is the game about?

That's what I was getting at with the OP. My stance would be that you as the player have to have this coherent image of the character, with all her merits and flaws. What you do then in the game is a) Allocate game resources like ability scores, skill points, etc. to make your vision of your character work within the framework of the game system, and b) behave like your character would. If you do both things consistently, it doesn't matter that much whether the game relegates the exploration of a dungeon chamber to a series of dice rolls, or whether players are expected to do that work via role-playing, with the caveat that there should be some assistance from the DM to model character abilities that player's simply cannot accomodate (like having a flash of insight).

It has to do with what each player wants out of the game. Some want to play the game as a reality puzzle, others want to play the game as a theater performance.


Different games like different software programs can be designed to support different approaches and different kinds of fun. There is no right or better way here; it is simply different players with different preferences. And heck, no one's saying people can't or shouldn't take whatever approach they desire. So try different approaches and see what you want. Not every game is for every customer, but not every game is designed to support every style of play too.

The first sentence here is vitally important. The game is all about the people playing it because they are the ones investing time in an activity they expect to be fun.

It really depends on what the individuals find fun. If the game is a challenge only for the character (a collected pile of data) what excitement and engagement is there for the player. In theory anyone could run that character and deal with the challenges exactly the same way. The character succeeds in combat. The character discovers a vital clue. The character outwits a clever villain. Where is the sense of involvement for someone (such as a person) in all this?

It's probably the same involvement actors have with their roles. It's just that some people can have a lot of fun in this way, and others look for different forms of engagement.

But the stance is not the only determining factor on what I expect from game mechanics. The general focus of the game is as important.

If I want to focus on exploration, that is what I spend my time and mental energy on. That is where my decisions are important. I want my input to be the crucial part in deciding what I find and what dangers I bring upon myself. There may be no rolls for this, or the rolls being only a small factor. On the other hand, in such a game combat situations may be resolved by a single roll, with no more tactics than "I try to kill it", "I run" or "I delay it until my friends open the door".

If the game focuses on something else entirely, then searching for things is a detail. I don't want to waste time on something that is not important; searching does not need my attention and my choices. I'll gladly delegate it to a roll, with no need of any special modifiers.

In general, trying to focus on everything is a bad idea. It takes a lot of time and is neither engaging nor interesting. In my gaming group, we decide what we are, at a given time, most interested in and choose an appropriate game for this. Such a game lets us focus our attention and choices on the important matters, while handling the rest quickly and with no hassle.

The focus of the game is probably already established in whether it's rules-heavy or rules-light. Rules-heavy systems are about character challenges, but tend to paradoxically encourage the disconnect between player and character, as there is a lot more to gain from metagaming.
Rules-light systems seem to be more focused on player challenges, but in my view, they also make it easier for players to simply play out their characters the way they imagine them.

There is a fine line in gaming for meta-gaming and I don't mind having to roll the dice to see if I can figure something out in-character as opposed to out of character. Most of us have been playing long enough to know the strengths and weaknesses of various monsters (i.e. trolls weak to fire), but have to remember that our characters that we are playing have never encountered these beasts before and wouldn't know a lot of these things.

The troll dilemma is a basic test for how you want to play the game. Either you can stand to be attacked by the same monster again and again because no character knows how to make it stay dead, or you can't.

 

[LostSoul]

That's what I was getting at with the OP. My stance would be that you as the player have to have this coherent image of the character, with all her merits and flaws. What you do then in the game is a) Allocate game resources like ability scores, skill points, etc. to make your vision of your character work within the framework of the game system, and b) behave like your character would. If you do both things consistently, it doesn't matter that much whether the game relegates the exploration of a dungeon chamber to a series of dice rolls, or whether players are expected to do that work via role-playing, with the caveat that there should be some assistance from the DM to model character abilities that player's simply cannot accomodate (like having a flash of insight).

I think there is a big difference, but maybe I don't understand what you mean by consistently allocating character resources and behaving like your character.

Simple example:

[sblock]Room 1 of the dungeon has the following scrawled on the wall:

"To reach your goal you must pass through the wilderness. Follow the stag."

The walls of Room 3 are covered in different frescoes: a city, a saint, and a forest scene with a stag. The stag is looking at a specific branch. Pushing on the branch opens a secret door.

In one game, the players have to figure out that they have to manipulate the branch.

In another game, the players have to allocate enough character resources to their "Find Secret Doors" or "Understand Clues" skill and roll high enough.

These are fundamentally different choices the players are making. I don't think that you can say that the difference doesn't matter.[/sblock]

Anyway, that should clear up my point of view. I'd be interested in hearing you expand on your point above.

 

[The Shaman]

My character is a little tweeting bird chirping in a meadow.

My character is a wreath of pretty flowers which smell bad.