Character Generation

You can use this thread to discuss character ideas and to ask questions.
Do people prefer point buy or standard array?
I think any race and classes published in official WOTC 5e material should be fine.
It would be nice to have a nice spread of classes, at the very least.

Thanks for the invite!


Thematically speaking, are there any classes or general build themes that would be inappropriate for this story? I travel extensively for work which often leaves me a lot of time to post, so I usually play tanky frontline type characters so I can push post without risking a low health wizard or something.

I mostly play Pathfinder, so I think I prefer point buy, but I don’t really care all that much.

Hello! Glad to have you!

I can’t really think of anything that would be totally off theme. I guess it is a darker take on fairy tales, so the PCs don’t necessarily need to compound on that. Though, if you really want to play that morally grey character, that would be fine.

There are no deities to speak of. At least not that I’m aware. But something can power a cleric or a paladin. That’s for the player to convince us of! :D (well, let me really comb the book one more time.)

I think the only thing to be really conscious of, are the limitations of PBP. Perhaps an army of skellies etc might bog down post speeds, unless you’re on top of things.

We can imagine this Neverland island as it’s own little pocket dimension. Like Ravenloft.

I prefer heroic roll place where appropriate -- heck heroic roll static placement with one swap is a lot better than standard array or point buy -- as they are outlined --- in my games I do it this way 3d6 (keep 2) add 6 this tends to get a heroic character which in my opinion is much more appropriate for the game settings and more fun to play ;) and I have never had a player complain and ask to do the array or point buy versions

Ooo Captain Hook seems to be a spin on the curse of the treasure of Hernán Cortés on Isla de Muerta from the Pirates of the Caribbean but sort of in reverse instead of appearing as skeletons in moonlight they appear as skeletons in daylight.

So I just tried 3d6+6 keeping the two highest and rolled

16, 18, 14, 18, 13, 15 before racial modifiers.

Which seems a bit high, for level three characters. :D

Those rolls were for my character, right?? Nothing like a monk starting lvl 3 with a 20 DEX, 19 WIS and 19 AC.
Seriously though, heroic rolls does sound fun, but I'm good with Point Buy or Standard Array too.

I've been wanting to play a Way of Mercy Monk since Tasha's came out. I'll read up a bit on the setting and work on background and flavor to match the setting.

Keep in mind that one set of rolls is not always the best determinant

3d6 + 6 average is 3.5, 3.5 = 7 + 6 = 13 with a slightly better odds at something a bit higher I have not had any players roll anything horrible over the top nor horribly low it basically averages out across the characters

Note in saying this I have had probably in the neighborhood of 24 players make those rolls on this forum -- and some have even gotten 8s which means they rolled 3 1s and only a couple of have gotten 18s but again the key is the players get to be heroic and you never need to balance the game against the characters just the characters against other characters --- as you can scale the game however you want

If you feel its too high then just go 2d6+6 drop nothing or maybe 3d4 + 6 as that would keep help curve it up a bit more and then say you can re-roll if your average is not 13 or higher

That said you could do the ole standard of 4d6 drop the lowest -- and if you do not average above 13 you can reroll -- however you will find that tends to be more uneven amongst the players

One of the benefits of standard array is that it leans into the idea of roles within the group. The wizard knows arcana, the thief is the sneak. Rather than having a fighter who is also the resident historian, and the Paladin who can also sneak behind enemy lines. For the most part it gives everyone a space at the table to have their moment. Rather than having a Wizard that luckily rolled all above 13, and a rogue who has good dex sure, and average to bad everything else. Though I’m not fooled into thinking that everyone but a wizard won’t dump int. :D

Point Buy is similar, though it does tend to be more focused. But at least players can choose their role to lean in to. I’d expect a lot of 15 15 15 8 8 8 arrays.

Its your game so its your call - I just threw out some food for thought

Thank you very much! It’s always good to hear other ways of doing things. That particular array just seems about front loaded for me! It’s been a while since I’ve DM’d 5e too, so I guess I’d rather stick by the book for the time being.

On the other hand, I also don’t want anyone to feel like they have to play in a game that they think they might not enjoy, or that doesn’t match their expectations. I know that you’ve all signed up for this game, but I’ll have no bad feelings if you think it’s not for you, either during character creation, or later on! Just drop a message and it’s not a problem!

Does anyone have any character concepts they’d like to try out?

Sounds like we have a monk at least! :)

I don’t think we have much to gain from a ‘heroic’ stat array. There’s five of us, we’ll already be stepping on each other’s toes. A little overlap is great, but with a high point-buy equivalent And five PC’s you end up in a situation where the player who always takes center stage is whoever can post the most frequently since everyone can do everything decently well. I prefer a "stay in your own lane" play style -not with adamantine guardrails, it’s always funny to watch the 8 charisma barbarian shove the bard out of the way and attempt to seduce the sorceress- but I like everyone to have an equal chance to shine. Let the bard seduce the sorceress while the rest of the party plays moody music most of the time, let the barbarian out-drink the militiamen while the rest of the party distracts the sergeant most of the time etc.

I have to admit I’m not super well versed with 5e. I played a handful of one-shots when the system was new but haven’t played since. I welcome any corrections or advice.

I was thinking of a Circle of the Moon Druid. I’ve wanted to do a shapeshifter since I started playing TTRPG’s, but the chance just hasn’t come up yet. This seems like a good campaign for a Druid though.

Does 5e need a dedicated healer? As I said, I mostly play Pathfinder and in Pathfinder you would never waste a spell slot or limited class resource on a healing spell, you just need someone who can use wands of healing, restoration etc.

I’m definitely in the "experimental" phase of TTRPG, and am happy to try out just about anything, but certainly don’t have to.

As far as healer goes, Way of Mercy monk has some healing ability that is renewed on short rests, so MAY be able to serve as emergency healer. But I’ve never played it so....

With 5e healing strategy, most folks feel it’s most efficient to only heal when a party member is actually down. There’s certainly some situations that would overrule the conventional wisdom though. And I tend to favor "the story" over efficiency to some degree, so there’s that.

I really think folks are confusing role playing with mechanics I run 4 games with players that have rolled using the method I portrayed and they are 5 players and no one is stepping on anyone else's toes because they are role playing their characters nicely. The only time I have every had issues with someone hogging the spotlight is generally due to poor role playing or bad character concept (the latter is something as a GM I guard against)

@rollcage, I don’t think a dedicated healer is necessary. Damage will almost always outpace healing during combat. I don’t intend to be an overly brutal Dm. I’m not gonna pull a "gotcha! You touched the death thingy!" on anyone! But if PCs get into a situation where they might die, then that’s how the dice fall!

I think a Druid would be nice, yes! Once you feel like you’re on top on the mechanics. Creature stats, mostly! Should be too hard to find all that online!

@oddtrails, One of the nice things about pbp is how easy it is to get in some rests, so you heals should be available pretty often too!

@DeJoker, What are some problematic character concepts you look out for?

I'm fine with whatever stat array. High point-buy equivalents do open up fun options that are normally difficult to pull off.

@KCC69: If I do a druid I will make sure to have the animal forms I use all statted out ahead of time. I was thinking maybe Firbolg or Tortle for race. Would either of these be legal? That website doesn't have sources on the pages that I can see, so I have no idea if they're WOTC content or not. Back when I played it was just the CRB lol.

I'm not marrying the character just yet, for the record. I want to hear from everyone else first.

Concept wise it has to mostly do with the concept -- I am a loner -- but its a group endeavor? I want to play a nasty guy -- rarely mixes well in groups. Plan and simply I avoid most of my issues by denoting I expect it to be a group thing and then warn players yes you can go off on your own but I do not pull punches if you step in the deep end and no one can throw you a line chances are you will die. Also I only run the heroic adventures so I limit the alignments (which are just guidelines) to LG, NG, CG, and LN -- that means I do not have to deal with the evil oriented alignments (CN, LE, NE, CE) or the NN alignment that often gets played NE

Basically I am trying to run a game where folks have fun as a group not as individuals and if things happen I warn some players that I will focus on the majority. Aka I never mince words or give false expectations and that generally keeps things clear sailing.

Other than that I am just keeping an eye on the character builds to make sure no one is exploiting something that will make them out of balance with the rest of the players -- because as I said previous I can scale the game to the characters -- and if the players are balanced with one another -- no gets left out or out shined -- my rogues are still the primary rogues, my fighters are still the primary fighters --- as the stats (at lower levels) might make the some of the skills redundant but as you progress in levels skill (proficiency bonus) out weighs raw talent. And at the lower levels it is nice to have redundancy.

Hey KCC69 I have a tweak for the Druid that I use in my games that you might find interesting, it does away with the concept of -- uh what animals have they seen already (which I find a pain) and the why do they intricately know so much about how an animal operates if all they did was just see it once --- aka it branches into being more spiritually in tune and thus opens the door to any animal but restricts it to a good handful that you have to pick up front but can change later on -- kind of like wizards memorize spells but can change them later if they want

Oh and KCC69 if you would like to see my game and how it works you are formally invited as I am starting another here and the players are just getting created and there is room for one more in that group.

All that being said I am comfortable with playing whatever class best helps the party as I have played everything at one time as I am mostly interested in the role playing aspect of the game ;)

So what is the plan -- we going with the standard array/point-buys or something else

Seeing as we have some people that are getting started in TTRPG let’s go with standard array.

Tasha’s allows you to put your racial stats wherever you want, so I’m happy to work with that option too.

I’m waiting for the last two players to join. They’re taking their time accepting the invite. Given that it’s the weekend I’m inclined to wait and see what they do by tomorrow.

You all can start working on some characters then!

I hope this isn’t stepping on toes or otherwise out of place, but I own Tasha’s and a few other sourcebooks via dndbeyond.com which allows sharing with members of a campaign. If anybody’s interested I’d be happy to set it up so you can look it over.