How to come up with new things? [Archive] - Wizards Community

How to come up with new things? [Archive] - Wizards Community

Post/Author/DateTime Post
RayleeSwifteyes
10-10-06, 09:26 PM As, a noob to the whole character background, how do you vets find a way to not make the same character over and over?

I find a good character background, then have a hard time coming up with something new. I think some of the problem comes with the fact I never really get a chance to really expand a character (not enough levels in one campign).

Any advice?
Carey Z W
10-10-06, 09:27 PM How to do it? I think of characters I've see in movies, or books, or I think of an awesome moment I want to happen in a fight, then how somebody could learn to do that, and it works itself into a character.
MagnaSecuris
10-10-06, 11:01 PM Or you see a cool picture and want to turn it into a character concept. As you develop how you want your character to play (so as to emulate the picture), you figure out what training and history he would have. Then you know how he learned to be an adventurer, and it can be easier to figure out why.
TrueName
10-11-06, 11:25 AM I used to use the hero builders guide book. I let the dice fall where they will and then use my imagination as to how each one connects to and interacts with each other.

I now use a modified version of the Hero Builders Guide Book to create the background. The modified version has all the things included in the book, but it also has lots more options under each table.

When designing a new character, I choose to start with the background before I even consider ability scores, feats, skills, spells, equipment etc.

Once I have the back ground I search the web for various personality tests and take the test how I think the character would take it. This gives me an idea of his personality.

At first this approach appears to give a random character that you may or may not enjoy playing, but I find that because you create the links in the background it is very unusual for it to generate a character I don't enjoy playing (There is a psychalogical reason why you will usually end up enjoying the character, but this isn't a time or the place).

Don't know if this helps or not, but let us know.

Ian
theotherdraxen
10-11-06, 08:05 PM Playing the same character concept over and over again isn't necessarily a bad thing. The DMII has advice so that a DM can work any of his campaigns around it.

Variation is nice, though. Even if you don't get sick of the concept, the other player's might.

As for developing a new concept, reading lots of books inspires the imagination. You should also look to concepts that you haven't tried: if you last played a tough meat-shield, try playing a wizard next, and working off of the archetype (or stereotype, if you prefer) as your concept. Your character might develop querks on his own.
JadeSpider9643
10-12-06, 12:25 AM I like to flex my imagination. Ultimately probably only 0.01% of people ever have a truely original idea of any sort in their entire lifetime. Every time we dip into our "imagination" we're really just taking a random sampeling from the pool of our own personal life experiences. So if you want more interesting ideas to come out of your head, or simply just something new....you have to expand your pool of personal life experiences. The best way to do this is to avoid limiting your attempts to expand your experiences by using YOUR OWN pool of experiences.

The solution: Randomness!!!
Random Name Generators on the web, drive around town until your lost then go check out the first store selling anything your even mildly interested in, next time you rent a movie grab the one next to it no matter what it is (unless you've seen it, then go one more over).

One site I like to use is http://www.epilogue.net/art/ Hit the Random Image button and BAM! RANDOM IMAGE! just keep getting random images for more inspiration, and should you find something you really like, you can check out the artist's gallery. good site :ayyyy!:
Tarvok
10-14-06, 11:17 PM The nice thing about D&D is that, unless your GM is a backstory nazi, you don't really have to design the whole thing up front. Just start out by statting out your character, and if you want to end up with something different, do something different. Try to keep in mind the character behind the numbers, but just let the numbers flow, and let the character flow from the numbers.

Even if your backstory is a bit skeletal at level one, don't let that deter you. As you play, you'll think stuff up (that, or your DM just might throw stuff at you, and you'll figure out how to roll with it). I kind of run from the theory that your character pretty much already exists... you just don't know about him yet.

One thing that can help, however, is just read, a LOT. Read novels. Read history. Read political science. Read biographies, legends, myths. Read the news. Heck, read comic books. Try to see situations from other people's perspectives (particularly situations you are SURE you are right about). That will help not only in designing characters, but in plain old life.
Judging Eagle
10-16-06, 02:57 PM Yeah, reading helps a lot.

Also, remember:

"Truth is stranger than Fiction"

and

"Extraterrestials will not be more unusual than we can imagine, they will be more unusual than we can imagine."

The wierder, the better.
Melpomene
10-17-06, 09:17 PM Many of my charicters concepts begin with: "Gee, I'd really like this charicter to [blank]." This has been a number of things, from fitting into such-and-such a class to weilding the biggest sword possible to being a CE charicter I could stand playing. After that, I let the details fill themselves in. "Why would this charicter want to have such a big sword? What does this say about the kind of person they are?" Reverse engeneering at its finest.

Also, I got a little giggle out of the idea of being a goober nazi. ^_^
Aufenshauft
10-19-06, 03:05 PM I am more of a crunch-to-fluff player myself.

First, you look at the players and party. If you don't need to fill a role (preferred), then you look at what you last did and find something the complete opposite. Take an elven wizard as your previous character and take the opposite of one of it's traits:

Magical - play a barbarian or sneak-rogue
otherworldly - Knight type
ancient - young untrained or impulsive
refined - barroom social master rogue

Next, twist it. Using the ideas I have before, try these:

non-magical - Utterly unskilled at anything arcane, but facinated by magic Users. Maybe trying to look for an illusionist to worship and hire
non-otherworldly - Gritty warrior who has been a veteran of several issues around an area, but secretly hoping that his actions will get him praise in the archives so he can achieve immortality as a hero
non-ancient - premade to have to learn everything (from sharpening weaponry to alcohol), but can do one thing really well like casting a style of sorcery or some valuable craft
non-refined - pick up artist of epic magnitude, but really looking for that one that has a will save that resists what he brings- that is the woman he will marry

Before you go too far, pick your proposed build. This really depends a lot on the group, but there are a huge number of classes out there to do just about anything. This is where the other player's choices may mess up your ideas. I can't give you too much help here, but since your prospective PC is so basic yet, there should be plenty of leeway.

Lastly, sit on it. Usually, as you toy around with the person's mentality on things, it evolves. Our rake from the non-refined list may need to have some contacts: do they like him (he is a great rake), or is he slapped a lot (a Jack Sparrow)? What does he do for his income? A Bard might focus on belching contests as a performance skill teamed with feats of athleticism, an urban ranger type might try for that tough-guy rebel look that seems to affect women so well and gets jobs as a bouncer, but both have social skills.

Then, when you have it percolating just right, you have a character which your DM will work hard to make a campaign around. Rule #1: always be interesting. It helps your survival rate. Honest.

I can also see a second way of doing this, far less story-driven and more top-down.

Pick a feat or class that just caught your eye.
In this case, I take a feat from the BoEF which gives a skill bonus to a character for 24 hours if they have... relations... with others. (this is a serious build, so keep reading)

Optimize it.
The feat stacks, so he will have a spectacular ability score, but has to get It regularly. Easy fix, get him a cohort that he is married to (3 repeats of the original feat, leadership at 6th, and that is all a human's slots- so he's human) For classes, let's get a sorceror to really use that ability score.

Explain it.
Well, who wouldn't mind a 24+ charisma guy walking around... until he hit on every woman he could on a daily basis? This guy would have to be close to town, and would likely keep mobile, but his save DCs would be awesome. Perfect for a charm person. Let's pull an idea from above with our anti-sophisticated rake and have him fall in love with a spellthief. He charms her for a night, then she gets revenge on him by stealing the spell and charming him repeatedly. (note the choice of classes here is another optimization trick)

For some reason, they grow to get along in that sort of common-enemy or one-upsmanship that makes some relationships. Besides, she takes advantage of him too, and that is just fine with him (though the poofy shirts she likes him to wear all the time are hard to explain to others).

Bring it to the DM
This is usually the tough part, since in my example it uses an unusual mechanic many DMs will be squeamish about, but it does work, and it certainly isn't overpowered. This is also a case of two skumbags which together dragged them out of the hole that was their lives. Could be interesting (remember Rule #1!).

Make it evolve
Just because you have a character concept doesn't mean you are finished. What happens to this unlikely couple? How do they get around the little issue of noonies? (Rope Trick... must... learn... RopeTrick) Will they become horribly possessive, or loose and risk loosing the other? How often will they fight, how do they challenge the other?

What does the PC Paladin say to finding you tossed out of that Rope Trick without your clothes in the middle of a fight? Do you dispel the Trick on her to do it right back to her? What classes will they go to, maybe he becomes a mindbender and she finds religion and becomes a Stalker of Karesh (hunter of evil). Eventually, she will become pregnant you know....

That's an interesting couple, and nasty ones to cross.

That is just two character building theories which I have, but it would be a good baseline to make up your own.
Need_A_Life
10-20-06, 06:08 PM I get requests from people who play things I'd never consider... drow rangers, gnome druids, shifter rogues... *shudder*

It helps me keep a fresh mindset, though there is the occasional burnout, I think that there's one or two backgrounds that I've had to say "can't write this, too hard" (I think it was something about a githyanki bard who grew up among elves or something like that... just proves than there's always a more twisted mind out there)
The Smartest Lemming
10-20-06, 10:01 PM The best way that I've found to come up with a character is to try and figure out how you want to act for your character at the gaming table. You of course do not have to actually act, but the idea is that if your character is going to be flamboyant in game, your are going to at least have to be talkative at the table, because how can you get across your characters personality otherwise. I find that I lean more towards the less talkative personality types, like the paranoid, or the stoic, or the wise sage, prankster etc., because I do not usually talk a whole bunch within my gaming group, so those personality types suit me more often than not.

After I've come up with the idea of the kind of character that I am going to play, I then choose the necessary mechanics for the character, such as race, class, age, and gender. The nice thing is that no type of emotion is limited to a certain class. You can be a wise sagely anything. Of course there are the more typical choices of a wise sage type character, which would be the wizard, cleric or monk, but you can choose to do practically any character class if you do not want to play one of those classes. For example you could be the wise experienced rogue/bard/warrior who always has bits of wisdom translated into one liners for every occasion.

I've got to say my favorite character idea was thought up when I decided that I wanted to create an extremely lazy character. I decided to play a wizard, mainly because they had the most spells available for "laziness." One of my favorite sessions was after my group had been jailed for various offenses true and untrue. The only magic that was not allowed within the jail was anything that would take you out of the jail, otherwise everything else was cool. So while the other party members were concocting plans of escape, he fabricated himself some luxuries like a nice plushy chair and a large feather bed, and did favors for other inmates for items, like fine wines, that he could not magic up himself. After that he just got comfortable and waited for the day of the escape. My favorite line of his was "Johnson, we're escaping, you should come, it'll be grand." this was said as he was sitting upon a luxuriously plush chair propelled by tensors transparent disk, smoking on a fine cigar, with a glass of brandy being held up before him by a mage hand. The only time he would ever really do anything was whenever he was disturbed from his relaxation, and he only really traveled with his party for the entertainment and the chances at obtaining more luxuries for himself.

This character could have been anything though. A warrior who waits for his enemies come to him, because he's to lazy to go charging into a battle. A rogue who has a cohort who carries around all of his items for him, and hands them to him whenever he asks, much like a golf caddy. An archer who has a cohort wind up his x-bows for him. A monk based on passivity and only uses pressure points to take a foe out. Each of these character ideas comes from a starting point of laziness, but each could have completely different personalities if you wanted them to.

Well that's how I like to create a character, and it works for me anyways.
Hope I helped.
Judging Eagle
10-25-06, 04:27 AM Four three two words:

Awakened Apple-tree Fighter.

I got the idea here a few days ago while coming up with two unique characters who knew each other but oe of the two really hates the other and one is more evil, while the other is more good. Now, I'm really eager to play it in a game. Really.

I'll prolly use it as an NPC though, I've got too many really good NPC ideas though.

Post/Author/DateTime	Post
RayleeSwifteyes 10-10-06, 09:26 PM	As, a noob to the whole character background, how do you vets find a way to not make the same character over and over? I find a good character background, then have a hard time coming up with something new. I think some of the problem comes with the fact I never really get a chance to really expand a character (not enough levels in one campign). Any advice?
Carey Z W 10-10-06, 09:27 PM	How to do it? I think of characters I've see in movies, or books, or I think of an awesome moment I want to happen in a fight, then how somebody could learn to do that, and it works itself into a character.
MagnaSecuris 10-10-06, 11:01 PM	Or you see a cool picture and want to turn it into a character concept. As you develop how you want your character to play (so as to emulate the picture), you figure out what training and history he would have. Then you know how he learned to be an adventurer, and it can be easier to figure out why.
TrueName 10-11-06, 11:25 AM	I used to use the hero builders guide book. I let the dice fall where they will and then use my imagination as to how each one connects to and interacts with each other. I now use a modified version of the Hero Builders Guide Book to create the background. The modified version has all the things included in the book, but it also has lots more options under each table. When designing a new character, I choose to start with the background before I even consider ability scores, feats, skills, spells, equipment etc. Once I have the back ground I search the web for various personality tests and take the test how I think the character would take it. This gives me an idea of his personality. At first this approach appears to give a random character that you may or may not enjoy playing, but I find that because you create the links in the background it is very unusual for it to generate a character I don't enjoy playing (There is a psychalogical reason why you will usually end up enjoying the character, but this isn't a time or the place). Don't know if this helps or not, but let us know. Ian
theotherdraxen 10-11-06, 08:05 PM	Playing the same character concept over and over again isn't necessarily a bad thing. The DMII has advice so that a DM can work any of his campaigns around it. Variation is nice, though. Even if you don't get sick of the concept, the other player's might. As for developing a new concept, reading lots of books inspires the imagination. You should also look to concepts that you haven't tried: if you last played a tough meat-shield, try playing a wizard next, and working off of the archetype (or stereotype, if you prefer) as your concept. Your character might develop querks on his own.
JadeSpider9643 10-12-06, 12:25 AM	I like to flex my imagination. Ultimately probably only 0.01% of people ever have a truely original idea of any sort in their entire lifetime. Every time we dip into our "imagination" we're really just taking a random sampeling from the pool of our own personal life experiences. So if you want more interesting ideas to come out of your head, or simply just something new....you have to expand your pool of personal life experiences. The best way to do this is to avoid limiting your attempts to expand your experiences by using YOUR OWN pool of experiences. The solution: Randomness!!! Random Name Generators on the web, drive around town until your lost then go check out the first store selling anything your even mildly interested in, next time you rent a movie grab the one next to it no matter what it is (unless you've seen it, then go one more over). One site I like to use is http://www.epilogue.net/art/ Hit the Random Image button and BAM! RANDOM IMAGE! just keep getting random images for more inspiration, and should you find something you really like, you can check out the artist's gallery. good site :ayyyy!:
Tarvok 10-14-06, 11:17 PM	The nice thing about D&D is that, unless your GM is a backstory nazi, you don't really have to design the whole thing up front. Just start out by statting out your character, and if you want to end up with something different, do something different. Try to keep in mind the character behind the numbers, but just let the numbers flow, and let the character flow from the numbers. Even if your backstory is a bit skeletal at level one, don't let that deter you. As you play, you'll think stuff up (that, or your DM just might throw stuff at you, and you'll figure out how to roll with it). I kind of run from the theory that your character pretty much already exists... you just don't know about him yet. One thing that can help, however, is just read, a LOT. Read novels. Read history. Read political science. Read biographies, legends, myths. Read the news. Heck, read comic books. Try to see situations from other people's perspectives (particularly situations you are SURE you are right about). That will help not only in designing characters, but in plain old life.
Judging Eagle 10-16-06, 02:57 PM	Yeah, reading helps a lot. Also, remember: "Truth is stranger than Fiction" and "Extraterrestials will not be more unusual than we can imagine, they will be more unusual than we can imagine." The wierder, the better.
Melpomene 10-17-06, 09:17 PM	Many of my charicters concepts begin with: "Gee, I'd really like this charicter to [blank]." This has been a number of things, from fitting into such-and-such a class to weilding the biggest sword possible to being a CE charicter I could stand playing. After that, I let the details fill themselves in. "Why would this charicter want to have such a big sword? What does this say about the kind of person they are?" Reverse engeneering at its finest. Also, I got a little giggle out of the idea of being a goober nazi. ^_^
Aufenshauft 10-19-06, 03:05 PM	I am more of a crunch-to-fluff player myself. First, you look at the players and party. If you don't need to fill a role (preferred), then you look at what you last did and find something the complete opposite. Take an elven wizard as your previous character and take the opposite of one of it's traits: Magical - play a barbarian or sneak-rogue otherworldly - Knight type ancient - young untrained or impulsive refined - barroom social master rogue Next, twist it. Using the ideas I have before, try these: non-magical - Utterly unskilled at anything arcane, but facinated by magic Users. Maybe trying to look for an illusionist to worship and hire non-otherworldly - Gritty warrior who has been a veteran of several issues around an area, but secretly hoping that his actions will get him praise in the archives so he can achieve immortality as a hero non-ancient - premade to have to learn everything (from sharpening weaponry to alcohol), but can do one thing really well like casting a style of sorcery or some valuable craft non-refined - pick up artist of epic magnitude, but really looking for that one that has a will save that resists what he brings- that is the woman he will marry Before you go too far, pick your proposed build. This really depends a lot on the group, but there are a huge number of classes out there to do just about anything. This is where the other player's choices may mess up your ideas. I can't give you too much help here, but since your prospective PC is so basic yet, there should be plenty of leeway. Lastly, sit on it. Usually, as you toy around with the person's mentality on things, it evolves. Our rake from the non-refined list may need to have some contacts: do they like him (he is a great rake), or is he slapped a lot (a Jack Sparrow)? What does he do for his income? A Bard might focus on belching contests as a performance skill teamed with feats of athleticism, an urban ranger type might try for that tough-guy rebel look that seems to affect women so well and gets jobs as a bouncer, but both have social skills. Then, when you have it percolating just right, you have a character which your DM will work hard to make a campaign around. Rule #1: always be interesting. It helps your survival rate. Honest. I can also see a second way of doing this, far less story-driven and more top-down. Pick a feat or class that just caught your eye. In this case, I take a feat from the BoEF which gives a skill bonus to a character for 24 hours if they have... relations... with others. (this is a serious build, so keep reading) Optimize it. The feat stacks, so he will have a spectacular ability score, but has to get It regularly. Easy fix, get him a cohort that he is married to (3 repeats of the original feat, leadership at 6th, and that is all a human's slots- so he's human) For classes, let's get a sorceror to really use that ability score. Explain it. Well, who wouldn't mind a 24+ charisma guy walking around... until he hit on every woman he could on a daily basis? This guy would have to be close to town, and would likely keep mobile, but his save DCs would be awesome. Perfect for a charm person. Let's pull an idea from above with our anti-sophisticated rake and have him fall in love with a spellthief. He charms her for a night, then she gets revenge on him by stealing the spell and charming him repeatedly. (note the choice of classes here is another optimization trick) For some reason, they grow to get along in that sort of common-enemy or one-upsmanship that makes some relationships. Besides, she takes advantage of him too, and that is just fine with him (though the poofy shirts she likes him to wear all the time are hard to explain to others). Bring it to the DM This is usually the tough part, since in my example it uses an unusual mechanic many DMs will be squeamish about, but it does work, and it certainly isn't overpowered. This is also a case of two skumbags which together dragged them out of the hole that was their lives. Could be interesting (remember Rule #1!). Make it evolve Just because you have a character concept doesn't mean you are finished. What happens to this unlikely couple? How do they get around the little issue of noonies? (Rope Trick... must... learn... RopeTrick) Will they become horribly possessive, or loose and risk loosing the other? How often will they fight, how do they challenge the other? What does the PC Paladin say to finding you tossed out of that Rope Trick without your clothes in the middle of a fight? Do you dispel the Trick on her to do it right back to her? What classes will they go to, maybe he becomes a mindbender and she finds religion and becomes a Stalker of Karesh (hunter of evil). Eventually, she will become pregnant you know.... That's an interesting couple, and nasty ones to cross. That is just two character building theories which I have, but it would be a good baseline to make up your own.
Need_A_Life 10-20-06, 06:08 PM	I get requests from people who play things I'd never consider... drow rangers, gnome druids, shifter rogues... shudder It helps me keep a fresh mindset, though there is the occasional burnout, I think that there's one or two backgrounds that I've had to say "can't write this, too hard" (I think it was something about a githyanki bard who grew up among elves or something like that... just proves than there's always a more twisted mind out there)
The Smartest Lemming 10-20-06, 10:01 PM	The best way that I've found to come up with a character is to try and figure out how you want to act for your character at the gaming table. You of course do not have to actually act, but the idea is that if your character is going to be flamboyant in game, your are going to at least have to be talkative at the table, because how can you get across your characters personality otherwise. I find that I lean more towards the less talkative personality types, like the paranoid, or the stoic, or the wise sage, prankster etc., because I do not usually talk a whole bunch within my gaming group, so those personality types suit me more often than not. After I've come up with the idea of the kind of character that I am going to play, I then choose the necessary mechanics for the character, such as race, class, age, and gender. The nice thing is that no type of emotion is limited to a certain class. You can be a wise sagely anything. Of course there are the more typical choices of a wise sage type character, which would be the wizard, cleric or monk, but you can choose to do practically any character class if you do not want to play one of those classes. For example you could be the wise experienced rogue/bard/warrior who always has bits of wisdom translated into one liners for every occasion. I've got to say my favorite character idea was thought up when I decided that I wanted to create an extremely lazy character. I decided to play a wizard, mainly because they had the most spells available for "laziness." One of my favorite sessions was after my group had been jailed for various offenses true and untrue. The only magic that was not allowed within the jail was anything that would take you out of the jail, otherwise everything else was cool. So while the other party members were concocting plans of escape, he fabricated himself some luxuries like a nice plushy chair and a large feather bed, and did favors for other inmates for items, like fine wines, that he could not magic up himself. After that he just got comfortable and waited for the day of the escape. My favorite line of his was "Johnson, we're escaping, you should come, it'll be grand." this was said as he was sitting upon a luxuriously plush chair propelled by tensors transparent disk, smoking on a fine cigar, with a glass of brandy being held up before him by a mage hand. The only time he would ever really do anything was whenever he was disturbed from his relaxation, and he only really traveled with his party for the entertainment and the chances at obtaining more luxuries for himself. This character could have been anything though. A warrior who waits for his enemies come to him, because he's to lazy to go charging into a battle. A rogue who has a cohort who carries around all of his items for him, and hands them to him whenever he asks, much like a golf caddy. An archer who has a cohort wind up his x-bows for him. A monk based on passivity and only uses pressure points to take a foe out. Each of these character ideas comes from a starting point of laziness, but each could have completely different personalities if you wanted them to. Well that's how I like to create a character, and it works for me anyways. Hope I helped.
Judging Eagle 10-25-06, 04:27 AM	Four three two words: Awakened Apple-tree Fighter. I got the idea here a few days ago while coming up with two unique characters who knew each other but oe of the two really hates the other and one is more evil, while the other is more good. Now, I'm really eager to play it in a game. Really. I'll prolly use it as an NPC though, I've got too many really good NPC ideas though.