Flavor Builds: When Min/Max and RP collide [Archive] - Wizards Community

Flavor Builds: When Min/Max and RP collide [Archive] - Wizards Community

Post/Author/DateTime Post
Lluks
09-20-07, 05:52 PM Okay, so this is an idea that I got after reading the "Character Traits" section of the PhB2. Basically, they would suggest different feats and skills to make your character represent a certain trait. Now, I took this a step further, and came up with "Flavor Builds." Basically, you flesh out your character's personality, and then you use principles of Min/Maxing to give your character the best chance to succeed at being who he is. For example: You wanna play a righteous palladin crusader, who is valiant, heroic, and (almost) never flees in the face of evil. Now, that is a very RP goal. It's also a very dangerous goal: if you challenge great evil, then could often die horribly because not all DMs think "good always wins." Plus, it may cuase the other players to dislike your recklessness. Well, if you use the "reckless crusader" build, then you might be all right:

Race: dwarf
priority ability score: Constitution
Equipment focus: Armor
Feats: Toughness, Sheild Specialization (Heavy), Iron will, Armor Specialization (Full Plate)... etc.
Alternate class feature: Charging Smite.
Priority Skills: Sense Motive, Diplomacy

Some quick explanation: Being a dwarf is important for several reasons: First, they have a high constitution. Second, they get all kinds of bonuses against magic, (evil) giants, poisons, etc. Third, they allow you to use a dwarven waraxe in one hand as a palladin, which is one of the best weapons to pair with a shield. Fourth, they can still move around well in heavy armor. Charging Smite will help you avoid waisting your precious smite evil attempts, and it would suck to be decked out in tons of armor only to have your mount die. You'll have enough trouble looking out for yourself. Your feat choices and armor give you the highest possible chance to survive, so while you are reckless, at least you are smart about it. Finally, Sense Motive and Diplomacy help you find out who really is evil, and explain to the guards that your actions were just afterwards.

This approach can be applied to any character idea, this was just an example. Now I wanna know your thoughts, suggestions, and (hopefully) some flavor builds that you can imagine. If this was helpful, let me know.

[EDIT]

I've been to the CO boards too, but what they fail to do is cover the RP aspects of a character. Sure, they'll make a character that's good at one thing, but usually they'll only really give you cold, hard stats. (In that regard, I'm not reinventing the wheel, I'm adding treads.)

Another point, the above build wasn't supposed to a build in the same sense as the CO boards use. I'm not giving you a detailed list of feats, I'm just giving you guidelines of the direction to take your character.

Finally, the problem with the CO board is they tend to be librarian types who find obscure feats in books a lot of us don't have/ can't afford and when you ask to build an illusionist you get back a lot of obscure feats and what not that you don't understand/can't use.
Dragonlord20000
09-22-07, 11:58 PM CO boards does this, alot.

Heck look at the theoretical boards they have a thread running which is just statting up different characters like superheroes and such. All of the builds being pretty optimized.

However I don't mean to be rude, I'm just saying your reinventing the wheel.
CrimsonDeath
09-23-07, 02:56 AM Also, no offense, but that's not an especially optimized build. (I could go into why, if you really wanted to, but this isn't really the place for it.)

Post/Author/DateTime	Post
Lluks 09-20-07, 05:52 PM	Okay, so this is an idea that I got after reading the "Character Traits" section of the PhB2. Basically, they would suggest different feats and skills to make your character represent a certain trait. Now, I took this a step further, and came up with "Flavor Builds." Basically, you flesh out your character's personality, and then you use principles of Min/Maxing to give your character the best chance to succeed at being who he is. For example: You wanna play a righteous palladin crusader, who is valiant, heroic, and (almost) never flees in the face of evil. Now, that is a very RP goal. It's also a very dangerous goal: if you challenge great evil, then could often die horribly because not all DMs think "good always wins." Plus, it may cuase the other players to dislike your recklessness. Well, if you use the "reckless crusader" build, then you might be all right: Race: dwarf priority ability score: Constitution Equipment focus: Armor Feats: Toughness, Sheild Specialization (Heavy), Iron will, Armor Specialization (Full Plate)... etc. Alternate class feature: Charging Smite. Priority Skills: Sense Motive, Diplomacy Some quick explanation: Being a dwarf is important for several reasons: First, they have a high constitution. Second, they get all kinds of bonuses against magic, (evil) giants, poisons, etc. Third, they allow you to use a dwarven waraxe in one hand as a palladin, which is one of the best weapons to pair with a shield. Fourth, they can still move around well in heavy armor. Charging Smite will help you avoid waisting your precious smite evil attempts, and it would suck to be decked out in tons of armor only to have your mount die. You'll have enough trouble looking out for yourself. Your feat choices and armor give you the highest possible chance to survive, so while you are reckless, at least you are smart about it. Finally, Sense Motive and Diplomacy help you find out who really is evil, and explain to the guards that your actions were just afterwards. This approach can be applied to any character idea, this was just an example. Now I wanna know your thoughts, suggestions, and (hopefully) some flavor builds that you can imagine. If this was helpful, let me know. [EDIT] I've been to the CO boards too, but what they fail to do is cover the RP aspects of a character. Sure, they'll make a character that's good at one thing, but usually they'll only really give you cold, hard stats. (In that regard, I'm not reinventing the wheel, I'm adding treads.) Another point, the above build wasn't supposed to a build in the same sense as the CO boards use. I'm not giving you a detailed list of feats, I'm just giving you guidelines of the direction to take your character. Finally, the problem with the CO board is they tend to be librarian types who find obscure feats in books a lot of us don't have/ can't afford and when you ask to build an illusionist you get back a lot of obscure feats and what not that you don't understand/can't use.
Dragonlord20000 09-22-07, 11:58 PM	CO boards does this, alot. Heck look at the theoretical boards they have a thread running which is just statting up different characters like superheroes and such. All of the builds being pretty optimized. However I don't mean to be rude, I'm just saying your reinventing the wheel.
CrimsonDeath 09-23-07, 02:56 AM	Also, no offense, but that's not an especially optimized build. (I could go into why, if you really wanted to, but this isn't really the place for it.)