What's the Most Asinine Character Idea/Concept You've Dealt With?

[sniffles]

My friends and I love the Tick and wanted to do a stupid superhero game. Mostly we just came up with general outlines for characters. My favorite? I always wanted to make a hero named "Government Cheese." Sort of a dairy-oriented James Bond meets Friday from Dragnet. He'd just have stupid gadgets like his Swisserizer Gun that riddles enemies with holes and Limburger Stink Bombs. Of course he'd slip ridiculous puns in whenever he could: "We have to raid the thieves' hideout! That Roquefort (instead of rogue fort) can't be left unchecked!" or "Jim, you have to pick a side in this fight, you're not Swiss!"

My best bud came up with Captain Cuisinart, the cyborg/kitchen utensil (He zaps bad guys, demolishes buildings, he even juliennes fries!) and Jumbo Hirohito, the midget mutant elephant samurai. We also pictured making a movie with a character named Guy Incognito (from the Simpsons), where a pair of arms would spring out from inanimate objects that the guy was hiding in/behind (like a lightpost, with two arms showing up out of nowhere, or another person looking in an oven from a profile view and a hand popping out from inside, etc.

I even came up with villains to match them against. There was The Big Apple, a huge mutant apple the size of Kingpin from the comics who HATED any reference to the city of New York. Then there was Asscheeks Akimbo, the huge-butted sumo wrestler that sits on his enemies. Also, i just liked the idea of a villain named Jazz Hands that just waved his hands around like a bad beatnik dancer.

We never actually roleplayed this, but it was fun to talk about.

These are great! I may have to share this with my GM. We have an ongoing (if sporadic) comic superhero campaign, using the Risus rules-light system.

Actually, that does offer up some weird character concepts, although we're not hugely original with most of them. Our superteam in that game, the Additionals, is made up of:

Jack: based on Jack, the mascot of Jack-in-the-Box restaurants. Since Jack on tv is always shown doing all sorts of different activities, Jack in our game is a Jack-of-all-trades. He always drives a convertible car because his head is so big. He's never seen eating, and his hat never comes off, no matter what's happening.

The Spectacular Squirrel: was bitten by a radioactive squirrel and has squirrel powers, such as climbing and being able to store huge quantities of stuff in his cheeks (no, not down there!! ). He wears a squirrel costume complete with a tail, which for some reason he can manipulate as if it's attached to him, even though it's just part of his costume. But his costume doesn't have a headpiece, so he just wears a strip mask over his eyes. Like Peter Parker, he's a photojournalist, but his secret identity is Peter Brady, and he has kids named Marcia and Bobby. And a maid named Alice (although his Alice is young and attractive!).

Java Joe: Java Joe is Tweak, the caffeine-addicted kid from South Park, all grown up. He used to be a cop, but he made a fortune by having a deal with the underwear gnomes of Zurich (you have to have seen South Park). He has coffee powers. He always has a cup of coffee in his hand, never has to sleep, and can attack people by slinging hot stinging espresso foam in their eyes.

Ninja Princess: a mafia princess in her secret id, she learned ninja skills from her Super-Secret Book of Sneaky Ninja Tricks. She wears a pink ninja costume with lots of glitter on it, and rides a pink Vespa. When in danger she can call in a stunt double to take her place.

Gadget (my character): a gadgeteer patterned after Dr. Heller in the movie "Mystery Men". Among her gadgets are the Big Bopper (a giant boxing glove on a retractable spring), the Goo Gun, and some of the other items from "Mystery Men", like the Blame Thrower and Canned Tornado. She's accompanied by D.A.D., a tiny and mostly useless robot containing a copy of her father's personality.

Gamma Girl: the daughter of Radioactive Man (from The Simpsons), she's only 14 years old. She carries a lunchbox with some radioactive substance in it, with which she whacks the bad guys up-side the head, or blinds them.

For a while we also had Star Trekker, a Star Trek geek who'd been given real phasers and tricorders by aliens, and was forever trying to get his shirt ripped in combat (a la Captain Kirk). Unfortunately his player moved out of town.

Let me tell you, comic superheroes are a hoot to play!!

 

[sniffles]

Ahhh so ashamed am I. I'm playing a Pacificist Healer of Pelor in a Shackled City Campaign. however, I'm using the pacifist feats from the exalted deeds. Makes the character a lot more livable.

Actually why couldn't the cleric use subdual damage?

Best example for a pacifist cleric:
"The Bible says 'thou shalt not kill'. It doesn't say anything about kneecaps." Shepherd Book, Firefly.

 

[drowdude]

A couple more popped into mind....

One guy played some sort of mutant dwarf, named Ani, that was mystically spliced with a silverback gorilla. (This was back in 2e, waaay before templates and whatnot.)

And I mainly just heard stories about a guy who had left my old high school group before I joined... but the stories told of a series of characters named Conan I-XIII, and of rangers named "Robin Hood".... more than stories actually, the character sheets were still on hand (the DM had a habit of keeping stuff like that).

 

[MPA]

A fighting monk. My group fortunately doesn't use anything really weird.

 

[Mallus]

OT...


Mallus-
Just curious, are you in the Philly Budget Office? I was in the Chicago OBM for several years before focusing on IT.

Yes, but don't tell anyone I said so...

Oddly, I'm not in finance, I'm an IT consultant more-or-less permanantly on-site now.

 

[Warrior Poet]

Yeah, that could be it too… Although it seems like almost anyone could at least make a cheap Superman knock-off, if nothing else?

Yeah, totally good point. Batman and Spiderman, too. There are certainly enough references to those in pop culture that you don't have to be a comic grognard to be able to build something fairly similar.

Warrior Poet

 

[Warrior Poet]

That seems a bit harsh - after all, haven't we ALL wanted to play a stripper/hooker kung-fu ninja daredevil?


Errr... okay, maybe it's just me.

Scoot over. I'll take a seat on that bench.

Oh, wait . . . play? I thought you said "meet."

Warrior Poet

 

[StupidSmurf]

I was gonna say the same thing.

Maybe it all starts with the hobo. In a dark alley one night, shaking off a day-long drunk, the hobo witnesses something . . . otherworldly. It drives him to the bottle, and raving. Another night, outside of a diner, an author overhears the hobo's ramblings, and decides the guy would make a helluva character in a story, so he approaches to hear more and learn what he can. The hobo tells the author Terrible Things. The author writes it down, and is bothered by it, so he approaches his friend, the professor, who is well aquainted with a couple of archaeologists and an antiquarian. The professor relays information to these experts who recognize that Something Awful is afoot. They recruit another professor who knows geography and Where Strange Things Are Rumored To Dwell, and a plucky up-and-coming student tags along as part of a research project. The author, sensing a blockbuster in the making, accompanies the group, and happens to mention it in passing to the hobo, for whom he bought a meal to say thanks for the great ideas. The hobo, still haunted by what he saw, insists on coming along, in order to exorcise from his mind the Nightmarish Vision of that Fateful Night, and so the whole gang'ss Off To See The Dark Unholy God Who Dwells In Blasphemy! Fun for the whole family.

So, yeah, sounds like execution of the character, as opposed to concept, to me.

Warrior Poet

OK, now THAT is more like it. Sounds like it indeed was a case of bad execution as opposed to concept.

 

[StupidSmurf]

The fellow with the amnesiatic Ranger had a few other..er... "interesting" characters...

A bald-headed black woman who bore a startling resemblance to Grace Jones, had a wooden right foot, and a 6 Charisma. None of us are quite sure where this concept came from, and decided not to ask.

In my original AD&D campaign, a home-brewed affair, I allowed people to select The Lord God as their deity. So this guy, Mister Amnesiatic Ranger and Ugly One-Footed Woman, rolls up a Jewish paladin. Not only did he then use an accent that made him sound like an old Jewish woman from Brooklyn (Paladin was male, btw), but he also refused to adventure on the Sabbath. Since our games were on Saturdays, he decided that the day of the week as Saturday in fantasy time as well (I didn't really follow a calendar in those early days), so his character would literally sit outside the dungeon while everyone else ventured inside! He lasted two sessions, after which people finally had enough.

 

[Pants]

Worst one I've ever seen was a character I played back in 2e...

A Gnomish Wizard with multiple personalities that wore... a cooking pot on his head as a helmet. His two personalities were a high-pitched, childish, stereotypical gnome and an urbane, faux-british voice. They'd get into arguments with each other and he'd call himself names. Pretty annoying, though it was only a one-shot character.

I have a new(er) player that has some pretty... dumb ideas, most of them involving the phrase 'two-weapon fighting.'

Let's see... a scout (from Complete Adventurer) that fought with two-weapons.

A ninja that fought with two-weapons.

A monk/ranger that fought with two-weapons.

Nothing really weird, but the whole 'two-weapon fighting' fascination got annoying after a while...