Post/Author/DateTime	Post
#1 Novama Jun 17, 2015 8:24:33	I have a situation where  a player wishes to fulfill the concept of controlling multiple characters on the field at a time. I told him that dnd is really meant to be played with 1 character and that controlling other units on the field is a roleplay thing (unless you have a companion or follower).    To "get around the issue", he created a custom race called a twin soul. His creation has just one soul, so he calls it one character, but it has 2 bodies. He tries to balance out the tactical, offensive, and ability advantages he now has by splitting them between the races: 1. Health is averaged between the two characters (and their classes) and then cut in half. ex: 2 level 3 fighters with 11 health. 1 level 3 figther with his build would have had 22.   2. ability checks are done with just half the modifier 3. material resources are split between the 2 halves (though this is really just a rp'ing stipulation he set for himself) 4. if one falls unconscious, then they both go down regardless of the health of the other 5. they share a turn, but superior to the companion rules, the other half of the character can attack in the same turn as the other by using the bonus action.   After a session to field test the idea, the character went down several times from attacks that took down one half of the double. Ability checks and saving throws were failed most of the time due to the halved mods to the rolls. There were one or two fights that he was able to survive long enough in a fight to set up flanking with his characters and attack with them. Overall, he feels good about it so far.   I'm on the fense. On the one hand I feel the charater concept is underpowered and that it will become needlessly complicated to maintain and fall behind the other characters....on the other, the concept opens up the potential for exploitation since its not thoroughly tested. I also feel that it undermines the need for good rp and teamwork with other players.   If you were in this situation with a player, how would you approach it? Any ideas that may lead to relieved dm, content player, and a relatively balanced character concept?
#2 AaronOfBarbaria Jun 17, 2015 9:19:18	Here are some options:   Option A: Ask the other players involved if they have a problem with the player having two characters to control. If they have no problem, just allow it - saying no becasuse "that's not normally how D&D works" is adhering to tradition for tradition's sake, which is almost never a good thing to do.   If they do have problems, seek solutions to those problems rather than immediately using them as a reason to say "no" to the player. For example, if the other players are worried that the player with two characters to control is going to have really slow turns or overall too many options, you could solve that by having the characters be simpler, such as one being a normal PC and the other being an non-spellcasting NPC out of the monster manual that will gain hit points, proficiency bonus increases, but not new powers as the game progresses.   Option B: Offer the compromise of using something that already nearly fulfils this player's desire that exists within the rules: a beastmaster ranger, a conjuration-focused spellcaster, or a character with access to animate dead and a few corpses.   Option C: Find time for the player to get to play out their desired dual characters in a future campaign, such as one that intentionally has less players so the additional character is a benefit to the campaign rather than a burden - I've run more than a few fun campaigns with only 2 players and each playing 2 characters - and let the player know that you are making this special plan for them. Then outright say "So no, you can't play two characters or anything like having two characters in this campaign."
#3 Lanliss Jun 17, 2015 10:24:07	I have a friend who wants to do the same. I intend to allow it in our less serious games, to see how well he can play from two different perspectives. If I decide he can role play the two characters separately, instead of acting the whole time as though he is one person, I might allow it in real games. How well did your player handle the two separate perspectives? Did he behave with one mind, or was he able to split himself into the two separate characters well?
(Reply to #3) Novama	Lanliss wrote:
#5 Lanliss Jun 17, 2015 13:05:34	This seems like meta gaming, generally frowned upon. It is the way of thinking where, instead of "How does my character feel about stealing this item?", a player will think more along the lines of "This item will give me some awesome stats.". From what I have seen on these forums some people will allow this to an extant, but most shut it down as fast as possible. Since DnD is supposed to be a role playing game, I would not recommend letting it go too far, unless the player can learn to role play at least a little. I have seen some decent posts on how to handle meta gaming, like changing some basic stats slightly. Unfortunately I have not seen anything to handle non role playing players. Maybe work on rewarding others for good role playing, but don't reward them, since they are basically running a robot. To prevent this from being unfair to them you may want to keep a close eye on them, in case they role play just a little, then reward them for that. Or you can just talk to them outside the game, telling them that they need to start role playing instead of meta gaming.
#6 Barky Jun 17, 2015 14:21:23	I wouldn't allow it at all.   First, I think it's lame. Beyond that, I believe in keeping all my players at roughly the same power level. It helps keep jealousies out of the game. Letting one player have two characters -- regardless of gimmick -- is not right.
#7 OoftaMeg Jun 17, 2015 15:03:08	Unless you are short of players, I would discourage it. I've played in games where one guy (and only that one guy)had multiple characters and it felt like it was just one overly powerful character. Because all their actions were perfectly in sync it felt like one character with double the actions and HP. He really stole the spotlight in combat on a regular basis. If you do allow it, just keep it simple and have him run separate characters, don't try to "pool" resources or anything.