AnotherGuy
Hero
Yeah, I'm not doing that anymore. I'm not accepting participation awards.With regard to my approach to Inspiration, I defer to the player. If they feel they portrayed the personal characteristic, that's good enough for me. If they cheese it, they'll get a groan from the rest of the group and that tends to make it so it's kept to a bare minimum. The real reward is not getting Inspiration, but the positive feedback one gets from the other players when you portray that characteristic in a clever way at exactly the right moment. (But, hey, I'll take that Inspiration too!)
I'm not unreasonable. The rest of the table is not either. I'm also happy for a character to add flaws, bonds and ideals to give the player a plethora to work with. But at this stage of my roleplaying game life, if someone is going to cheese at my table (and the rest of the players feel the same way about the attempt), I'm not going to give that a pass. Groans at a table are not always effective enough.
If someone wants to advance levels at my table using the Inspiration option, show me you worked for it. Otherwise there are two other options to seek.
I didn't add this system for someone to coast through on BS.