Your favorite suboptimal/non-combat characters

[wingsandsword]

The whole ongoing discussion about 4e making suboptimal combat characters impossible (or at least difficult to create), and discussion about how not all D&D characters are defined by combat role or being efficient "builds" has me thinking. . .

What are your favorite unoptimized, non-combat-oriented D&D PC's you've played (any edition)? I mean characters actually played in an ongoing game, and characters where they were not optimized for combat (not necessarily helpless, but certainly not built with their combat role or damage output in mind) but had another focus and they were still fun to play.

Here is my favorite. As you can see, he's not totally helpless, but this guy would be hamburger in a lot of campaigns. He was really fun to play and really useful with his skills and spells, but it definitely wasn't a typical Constant Dungeon Crawls/Kick In the Door type campaign:

Peritus Fiducia (3.5 D&D R.A.W.)
Peritus was born and raised on a world where magic was rare, wizards and actual spellcasting clerics were few and far between. Magic was rare enough that most towns probably would only have an adept or two, most wizards in the world knew each other personally, and actual spellcasting clerics are rare enough that by sheer nature of their status as actually blessed with true godly magic, a 1st level Cleric could be the head priest of a major temple.

Peritus was a greedy shopkeeper who operated a apothecary shop and clinic in a bad part of town (divine healing magic being rare, a good trade could be made as an apothecary). Occasionally he'd go off with some friends and try to harvest some exotic herbs or odd fungi in isolated locations (and pillage ancient treasure hoardes) while they were trying to save somebody from something.

One day, in a distant crumbling keep he got separated from his friends and found some bizarre ancient tomes on transmutation and alchemy. . .magic textbooks from another age, an age when wizards were far more common. Believing them to be of great value he pocketed them and read them in secret between expeditions. He became obsessed with the exotic chemistry and bizarre alchemy contained within. He was amazed at what it meant for his herbalism (and now alchemy & potion) business. Also, between what he learned reading those old journals and divination magics he uncovered he has begun to figure out dark secrets of the ancients including why divine magic is so rare and the truth about where the ancients who founded their civilization really came from.

Peritus Fiducia
LN Human Male Rogue 8/Wizard (Transmuter) 5

Ability Scores:
STR 8 +0
DEX 10 +0
CON 10 +0
INT 19 +4
WIS 14 +2
CHA 13 +1

AC: 20
HP: 40

Saves:
Fort: +3
Ref: +10
Will: +5

Attacks: (BAB +8/+3)
+1 Hand Crossbow +9/+4 1d4+1
+1 Silver Dagger +9/+4 1d4+1

Feats:
Skill Focus (Diplomacy), Diligent, Skill Focus (Profession: Apothecary), Skill Focus (Heal), Skill Focus (Craft: Alchemy), Scribe Scroll, Brew Potion, Craft Wondrous Item

Skills:
Appraise +17 (+19 appraising Alchemical items), Diplomacy +15, Decipher Script +17, Handle Animal +3, Craft (Alchemy) +23, Knowledge (History) +8, Knowledge (Arcana) +9, Spellcraft +10, Tumble +5, Heal +10 (+12 with healer's kit), Use Rope +4, Profession (Apothecary) +21, Hide +10, Listen +13

Languages: Common, Undercommon, Draconic, Elven

Class Abilities: Sneak Attack +4d6, Evasion, Uncanny Dodge/Improved Uncanny Dodge, Trap Sense +2

Spells Per Day: 4+1/4+1/3+1/2+1 (Barred Schools: Necromancy & Illusion)

Spells in Spellbook:
3rd: Water Breathing, Haste
2nd: Continual Flame, Rope Trick, Bull's Strength, Fox's Cunning
1st: Identify, Enlarge Person, Magic Weapon, Expeditious Retreat, Comprehend Languages, Protection from Evil, Magic Missile, Detect Secret Doors, Hold Portal
0th: Resistance, Acid Splash, Detect Poison, Detect Magic, Read Magic, Daze, Dancing Lights, Flare, Light, Ray of Frost, Mage Hand, Mending, Message, Open/Close, Arcane Mark, Prestidigitation

Equipment:
Bracers of Armor +6, +1 Silver Dagger, +1 Hand Crossbow, Ring of Protection +4, Ring of Sustenance, Type IV Bag of Holding, Immovable Rod, Spellbook, Collection of various potions & elixirs (condensed for brevity), collection of alchemical items (condensed for brevity), (lots of mundane goods omitted for brevity), healer's kit.

 

[Ralts Bloodthorne]

I wish I still had the PC sheet. I had the greatest cleric ever. Not quite RAW, quite a few GM power grants, but the rest of the group helped me.

His STR was 5, just enough to carry his bulk, a censer or other holy things one at a time, his robe, and a belt pouch.

He was horrendously overweight, had a hernie so he wore a truss, and bad knees. His speed was 5', he could not run or do heavy exertion without risking a heart attack (Fort Save: DC 10+1 per round) and could only run 2X normal speed.

He had a young acolyte who carried his stuff. He would often stop for tea while the party rushed into combat.

He had great healing, massive knowledge, could do circles and rituals, in exchange for NEVER doing a single combat spell.

He was great fun, even the other players thought it was funny.

 

[Wik]

I had a myopic gnome crossbowman, who couldn't see more than ten feet away, how had specialized in a massive heavy crossbow. Everytime he saw a bush, he was sure it was a goblin. And he got very upset when he was accused of being blind.

Normally, I don't play with such an "Outlier" (to use the DMG 2's terminology) approach, but it worked in this group. Mostly because there were a lot of us, and I was helping out the DM, so by playing a fruitcase, it felt like I wasn't taking advantage of the system.

I also like playing halfling fighters. In 2e, my halflling fighter was pretty useless, with his best attack dealing only 1d6 damage (he used a shortbow). His name was Griffin Wondersprig, and he was based off Peregrin Took mixed with Sam Gamgee. He was (and is) my favourite character ever.

 

[The_Warlock]

Thinking back, most of my suboptimal combat builds were still very supportive combat builds, ie, I was not the heavy hitter, but generally made others more effective by being there...

Aramnar, a half-elven bard (both 2nd and 3rd edition), specialized in whip - not for combat but for swashbuckler moves and depriving enemies of magical components, foci, and Mcguffins. Generally, he failed at these things, but kept trying.

He also had flying magic and usually kept enemies who flew busy with him instead of raining fiery death down on his companions. He excelled however at getting the party in good with the locals, getting cheap or free lodging for entertainment services, spotting inconsistencies between information given and evidence found, magically scouting areas, and having a useful spell or piece of equipment to get into or out of a place. Oh, and finding a way to use bardic lore checks on just about anything and everything you can possibly imagine.

That and rescuing pretty women (though they frequently turned out to be devotees of dark powers who were actually abasing themselves before the high priests rather than being sacrificed).

Sommar - a 3E rogue/psychic warrior, optimized for speed and self sufficiency in combat - he was always there to help someone else flank. But he was rarely the star of combat.

He specialized in stealth, infiltration, trap detection and removal, and interrogation - especially using various control light and control shadow powers to make it look like he could summon forth shadowfiends to cow captured enemies into spilling the beans.

His free time was often spent casing marketplaces for thieves, and stealing the stolen pouches and goods they had stolen, and making sure to get it back to the original owner.

There are others, but those two stand out as being the best as what they did outside of combat.

 

[Dykstrav]

I once played a wizard named Lekinvahr in a 3.0 Greyhawk campaign. Singularly the most fun magic-user type character that I've ever played. I avoided combat like the plague (having nine hit points at 3rd level and no armor does stuff like that).

Charm person combined with a few cantrips were the only spells he ever really cast. The DM once dropped me some wands because the party was complaining that we didn't have arcane firepower.

What made Lekinvahr so amazingly fun to play was playing him as intelligently as he really was. He had an Int of 17 and Cha of 15, so he typically used social networking skills with careful planning to get away with damned near anything. He never paid for room and board or food and drinks, Lekinvahr was a bit of a womanizer and never had much trouble finding receptive company.

The thieves' guild hired us to steal some documents from an abandoned house. I actually went out and purchsed a courtier's outfit and bluffed the assessor's office into thinking that I was a foreign creditor and was able to just walk in and take the documents. The DM actually derailed that plan as it unfolded because (in his words) the plan was just so simple and fast that it would derail the entire session.

I also researched some admittedly juvenile spells that proved very effective and literally stopped the game for an hour and a half (in a good way) when I first used them. Lekinvahr's colon cleanser makes the target lose total control of its bowels--and of course I used it when we were being chased by the city guard. We got away and everyone laughed until our sides hurt.

 

[The_Warlock]

That walk-in and take the documents wizard reminds me of an old character that fits this thread... Jereth Halifax, Imperial Scout Captain from the Traveller System.

I actually was the official gun toting maniac of the group...with multiple high rate of fire, long range conventional and energy weapons.

And I rarely used them. I tended to solve problems by overtipping people to get information and make contacts that came back to help me later, or using public governmental resources (like tax records, ship registrations, deeds, and such) to solve mysteries/murder cases/etc rather than the more high profile stake out/shoot out scenario one would expect.

Carousing was a core competency of the class, with a little blind eye to theft (if someone stole from me first), and basic mechanics. The last of which I used to trap my scout ship against pirates and boarders with various home made traps, akin to the Home Alone movies well before said movies came out.