This is mainly for people who are new to the game. Welcome
Your first task is........
Pick what you want to play....and play it. Play whatever your heart desires. Wanna play halfling Wizard? Awesome. You wanna be Dragonborn Thief, go for it. Want to play a clumsy half-orc paladin. Fantastic. Have fun!
Don't let some buzzkills ruin your fun. You don't HAVE to take a level in fighter before you take your wizard class. You don't HAVE to pick another race for your thief because it doesn't optimize with Dragonborn. Do what you want to.
And buzzkills, quit being so condescending. Not everyone cares about an "optimized" character. If someone asks for advice for a character build, offer it. But leave the words, " must", "need", "have to", etc... out of it. They dont have to do anything, and it damn sure doesnt make them stupid if they go outside the box. This is a game where we should let our imaginations run wild. Not try to pigeon hole everything down to a handful perfect builds.
Ok, rant over
Oh, and btw....Wizards clanking around in platemail is stupid 
hallows1999 wrote:
Leugren wrote:
Message to New Players:
If you are the type of person who doesn't mind being frequently upstaged by other, more carefully crafted characters, then by all means, follow @hallows1999's advice. If you are more prone to pen-s envy, however, then you might want to consider your choices more carefully. It's alright to play Sam Gamgee in a party full of Sam Gamgees, but you might start to feel a bit inadequate if Gandalf suddenly decides to join the crew. Or you might not. It's all about understanding yourself and having the right expectations so that you are not disappointed with your choices later on. Whatever you choose, stand by it, and don't let anyone browbeat you because it doesn't synergize well with their own choices, unless of course you happen to care about group synergy and effectiveness, in which case, feel free to browbeat the crap out of your teammates, since they are equally free to ignore you.
hallows1999 wrote:
AaronOfBarbaria wrote:
hallows1999 wrote:
Jell_Moo wrote:
Jokes contain humour.
Yunru wrote:
Yunru wrote:
Hey, I'm not insulting what you said, just your humour :P
hallows1999 wrote:
I don't disagree with everything you said in your rant either, but I would qualify the heck out of it. I have witnessed more than one new player who thought he was creating Conan, only to discover later through the course of playing that he was actually creating a relatively ineffectual character. This gap between expectation and reality can be a problem. New players need to understand the consequences of their choices, and they may not think to ask the right questions.
My advice would boil down to the following, find a buddy that has some experience with D&D. They do not have to have knowledge of 5th (but it would help) and use them as a resource when you hash out the character. A strong concept goes a long way when trying to build a character. Try to find the one or two things that you would like to be strong at and keep focused.
Leugren wrote:
BigWyzard wrote:
hallows1999 wrote:
BigWyzard wrote:
hallows1999 wrote:
Leugren wrote:
eleran wrote:
If it is ok I would like to address the inital post and ignore the tangents that have evolved.
To a new player. First Welcome!
If you are wanting to build a character or even wanting to know where to start, I suggest that you first talk to the DM and figure out what campaign he is running. Some times a DM may limit race or classes based on the way he built the campaign, or some races of classes might not exist in a specific world setting published by Wizards of the Coast.
Once you know about any specific restrictions you will want to create a concept to fit into the type of game he is running. This helps make playing easier since your character will feel like it belongs in the game he is running. Some times it can be fun to play a character that is not a great fit for the setting, giving you the added chalenge of playing an outsider learning the local customs. I suggest you do not jump into trying that untill you are comfortable just playing in the game and understand the rules. It is easier to focus on a character once you have a great understanding of the rules and how the DM you play with uses them.
If you have trouble thinking about a concept think of any comic book, movie, or video game character. Now think how could you make a old world version of that? There may be some mechanical parts based on how magic, or combat, or skills work that do not translate well so don't bog down in specifics, think only about general concepts and personality. Using this as a starting point you may end up getting further and further from the character you started with, this is fine you do not need to recreate the character only use it as a starting point. As long ans you are liking how the character is evolving into a full character concept keep on going. If you do not like how some things translate see if changing away from trying to make it fit works better or if you need to try it with a different class. The classes are not ridgid specific character types, they are a group of game mechanics with some general character over views. A fighter can be a knight, mercenary, samauri, pirate, assassin etc ... those words are descriptive character archatypes that can be made with multiple diferent classes. Each class would focus on a different way of achieving those concepts but they could each make a version of the concept.
Your character will evolve, just like a real person a character will not be set in stone. Their opinions and experiances will change them over time. This is an important thing to realize as your character concept may get left in the dust as your character progresses through the levels. I mention this because some players will become upset if their character deviates from what they built it as in the first place. Characters will act like people in movies that change as the movie progresses. They do not stay ridgid concepts.
I personally do the opposite. I look over how the classes work, note potential synergies too look into more closely, see which are valid. Create a character around that which works mechanically, and then I've got everything I need to build a backstory.
For instance, I've a (eventual) Sorcerer 15|Warlock 5. Great Old One and Dragon Linage (or w/e). Obvious Cha is high, Con is too because health is good. Wis is useful so that was tertiary. That left Str and Int being dumped.
From that I created the slightly-simplistic Sapphire who draws upon her families connection with an Eldritch Dragon in order to overcome her physical limitations.
eleran wrote:
Seraphex wrote:
hallows1999 wrote:
hallows1999 wrote:
shouldnt u be under a bridge or eating a goat right now?
AaronOfBarbaria wrote:
Hallows1999, you appear to have mistaken my comments regarding you undermining yourself, which I made in good faith to try and help you to understand why doing such a thing negates whatever point you might actually have had (regardless of topic), with me stating that I am some kind of optimizer or am going to tell people how they should build their character.
Second, the existence of unarmored wizards doesn't mean that armored wizards don't exist or are somehow inherently stupid... and I challenge you to find anything in-setting or canon that states explicitly that Merlin, Gandalf, Baba Yaga, Jafar, or Dumbledore couldn't go ahead and wear armor if they wanted to.
And last, but not least, for each of your D&D wizards you mention, I see you and I raise you one generic, nameless elf in elvin chainmail, and one modern, non-d&d fantasy video game, such as Skyrim, where wearing armor is an option whether you use magic or not.
hallows1999 wrote:
Gungolphus wrote:
I misunderstand nothing. You're misunderstanding me. You do not have the power to tell another player her choices are wrong. Correct and incorrect are entirely subjective. Your 4e example is prime. The other guy wanted to do something. He was going about it in a way you found unwise. That you found his choices unwise DOES NOT give you the right to pronounce yourself right and him wrong.
Bob