Playing a Class you don't really enjoy - Downloaded from the Wizards Community, all coding removed by Solauren

Playing a Class you don't really enjoy

Post/Author/DateTime Post
#1
Pyrate_Jib
Oct 06, 2011 10:10:54 New D&D game is starting up and you are super excited! You and your friends are creating characters for the campaign. Emails, Facebook messages, and text messages are flying about between friends in anticipation of the game. The DM has created a fantastic setting and has put in a lot of creative time in the design. The DM has only one request when it comes to creating PCs, one from each of the main power group settings (Arcane, Martial, Divine, Primal, and Psionic).

However when you arrive you discover that everyone else has claimed the power sources that you enjoy playing and classes you like. Only Divine remains (insert whatever class/ power source you do not like to play it doesn't matter). You've played those characters before and you just can't get into it. You had hoped to play (insert class) and considered (insert class) but now you are stuck.

The beautiful thing about 4E is you can still Multi-class or Duel class which helps. If you are stuck playing a Divine class you can still create an Invoker/ Wizard and get something close to what you wanted originally. Of course that may leave the party slightly weaker in that power source but it dovetails with the DMs request. I had a buddy who hated playing Fighters but would most likely jump at playing a Warlock Multi-class Fighter.

Of course there are other options. Trying to get a friend to switch with you. Asking the DM for an exception. Perhaps leaving the group.

What course of action would you take and why?
#2
Cohen95
Oct 06, 2011 10:18:18 "Hey guys, I don't really like playing (Power Source), and was kind of hoping to play (Power Source) or (Power Source). Is that okay with you, DM?"

If the DM says okay, cool, game on.

If the DM says no, bail. The DM is actively preventing you from playing a game the way you want to play it, and there's no point in playing a game you won't enjoy.
#3
slobo777a
Oct 06, 2011 11:55:14 Depends on how restrictive you want to go.

We were short a Leader in my current game, and I had a lot of trouble coming up with Leader classes I'd enjoy. Being further restricted to single power source would have broken it for me.

I would say my compromise in this kind of senario would be to make the restrictions on myself as minimal as possible: Ignore the party's role mix, think out of the box for races and perhaps as the OP suggests, hybrids. In short, try to make the DM's story plan work. If I was still unhappy with teh resulting character I would say so, and ask the DM (first) and rest of group (second) if there was anything they wanted to compromise on so I could have fun. I don't like using "well I won't play then" as an ultimatum, but then I also have friends I can talk to, and I have never found them unreasonable.

The example given (one of each power source) makes for a fragile campaign, because it is very difficult for a player to retire or lose a character and come back with something different.

Games I have played in with up-front character build restrictions like this include low-metal worlds (less kit for some classes), and one where all the PCs had to hit a ceratin bonus to Stealth. Both were fun to play in, if a little skewed balance-wise between classes.

#4
GelatinousOctahedron
Oct 06, 2011 12:27:38 Class, race, and role restrictions are fine if everyone is onboard with them and if they allow some player choice. And if someone really didn't want to play a power source, race, roll, or whatever DMs should generally not try to force PCs into one.

Some limits are fine, but the player needs to be able to have a decent number of choices and the DM and other players need to be willing to compromise. Its one thing if a player is demanding to play some bizzare concept that doesn't fit into the world, but that is not the case discribed here.

We play power source and race restrictions campagins in my in person group a lot, but everyone is on board with them. Sometimes the DM will say one person can opt out like when we once did an all elf campaign and my previous PC had been an elf so he let me play something else. We have done all psionic for both 3.5 and 4th, all martial and primal human, all elf, and in his homebrew ones we could pick from 2 or 3 power sources and a list of about 6 races for each campaign.
#5
salla
Oct 06, 2011 16:57:19
"Hey guys, I don't really like playing (Power Source), and was kind of hoping to play (Power Source) or (Power Source). Is that okay with you, DM?"

If the DM says okay, cool, game on.

If the DM says no, bail. The DM is actively preventing you from playing a game the way you want to play it, and there's no point in playing a game you won't enjoy.

This. Those kinds of things should be discussed among all players and agreed upon unanimously, not a sudden DM drop, and they definitely shouldn't have started divvying stuff up without you there!

It's hard for me to determine what I'd do, because I can't imagine my group doing this without my input and/or presence. Man, that was just freakin' rude ...

Honestly, I can be pretty spiteful, so I'd probably just play what I wanted, take a Multiclass Divine feat and then by-and-large forget about it.
#6
Pyrate_Jib
Oct 07, 2011 13:26:08 How would you react to a Player asking you to switch roles with him because he prefers a certain class? Say one Player always favors Rangers with the ranged longbow martial path. You figured you give a Ranger Beastmaster a try only to discover he wants to play the same thing yet again. Would you help a brother out and switch to a Divine role so he can play what he wants or encourage him to branch out and try something new?
#7
salla
Oct 07, 2011 14:05:45
How would you react to a Player asking you to switch roles with him because he prefers a certain class? Say one Player always favors Rangers with the ranged longbow martial path. You figured you give a Ranger Beastmaster a try only to discover he wants to play the same thing yet again. Would you help a brother out and switch to a Divine role so he can play what he wants or encourage him to branch out and try something new?

Ignoring for a moment that I wouldn't play a Beastmaster Ranger if you paid me ...

Normal Game:
A lot of it would depend on what he's wanting to switch with and for, really. If someone reallllly likes playing one thing, well, that's his business. I'd probably not change, though, as I can't imagine many parties being upset with having two Rangers (because that means stuff dies faster). I'd probably work with him to vary our skillsets and such (he trains Nature, I train Dungoneering, and so forth).

Your 'Unique Power Source game':
I don't care for divine characters much, myself, but I could probably suck it up provided I was going to play a cleric (I like the Leader role so much that I'm willing to play a cleric). Otherwise, like above, I'd just play whatever I want and slap a divine MC feat on it and call it a day.
#8
Cohen95
Oct 07, 2011 23:02:48
How would you react to a Player asking you to switch roles with him because he prefers a certain class? Say one Player always favors Rangers with the ranged longbow martial path. You figured you give a Ranger Beastmaster a try only to discover he wants to play the same thing yet again. Would you help a brother out and switch to a Divine role so he can play what he wants or encourage him to branch out and try something new?

What Salla said wrt Beastmasters, but to answer your general question, Probably.

I try to have a few different ideas stewing, and they're often pretty different from each other, so if someone was dead-set on, say, playing a controller, and I was already thinking about it, I'd probably switch up and play something else, to keep things balanced.

My first rule of D&D is "Play what you will enjoy playing."
#9
Macabre13
Oct 08, 2011 2:57:00
How would you react to a Player asking you to switch roles with him because he prefers a certain class? Say one Player always favors Rangers with the ranged longbow martial path. You figured you give a Ranger Beastmaster a try only to discover he wants to play the same thing yet again. Would you help a brother out and switch to a Divine role so he can play what he wants or encourage him to branch out and try something new?

I'd probably not switch. "You've run this character every single time, dude. Try something else so one of us can do it instead," basically. I couldn't recommend bailing on your gaming group just because you can't have your way with every single thing. Man up and try a new class before you go trying to switch everything around or quitting or whatever. You might have fun. Nobody would have asked for any of the songs in Guitar Hero 2 but it's totally got the best set list (before they just released everything ever for download but whatever). Guitar Hero 3 was basically design-by-request and was a pile of garbage. Point being, you might be surprised by what you find when you're handed something you never asked for.

They probably shouldn't have done it all behind your back, but what's done is done. You can either cry about it or work with it.

If you really hate Paladins and Clerics and...what's left Avengers? I dunno, doesn't matter, but if you hate them after giving them an honest whirl, then feel free make a valid fuss instead of an "I fear change" fuss.
#10
Krusk
Oct 08, 2011 9:29:47 It sounds like you are forced to play a divine class? Play a runepriest, they are basically not even divine. The descriptions sound more arcane if you have to pick an existing power source, but really they seem like their own source altogether.

I think I would be able to find at least one build from any power source I would enjoy, but I would also think one player would have been willing to trade with you.

It also sounds like you pretty much only play bow rangers, to which I say "stop". My friend drags her husband no one likes to our games pretty often. He always plays a dwarven fighter. Not only does that mean he is always the same thing, but it really gets annoying when we have to say "Well we already have a defender, so I will try to play something else to balance the party" or better yet "Hey [husband] we could really use a striker" "well I was really into a dwarven fighter this time, so Im going to do that". "Sweet, we don't need a striker anyway, combat in 4e really flies by.".

Don't be a dwarf fighter this game. Go ahead and give a dwarf paladin a shot. Its slightly different, but pretty similar. Or maybe a dragonborn fighter. slowly branch out, and try something similar but new.
#11
Cohen95
Oct 08, 2011 10:56:31
How would you react to a Player asking you to switch roles with him because he prefers a certain class? Say one Player always favors Rangers with the ranged longbow martial path. You figured you give a Ranger Beastmaster a try only to discover he wants to play the same thing yet again. Would you help a brother out and switch to a Divine role so he can play what he wants or encourage him to branch out and try something new?

I'd probably not switch. "You've run this character every single time, dude. Try something else so one of us can do it instead," basically. I couldn't recommend bailing on your gaming group just because you can't have your way with every single thing. Man up and try a new class before you go trying to switch everything around or quitting or whatever. You might have fun. Nobody would have asked for any of the songs in Guitar Hero 2 but it's totally got the best set list (before they just released everything ever for download but whatever). Guitar Hero 3 was basically design-by-request and was a pile of garbage. Point being, you might be surprised by what you find when you're handed something you never asked for.

They probably shouldn't have done it all behind your back, but what's done is done. You can either cry about it or work with it.

If you really hate Paladins and Clerics and...what's left Avengers? I dunno, doesn't matter, but if you hate them after giving them an honest whirl, then feel free make a valid fuss instead of an "I fear change" fuss.

While I can certainly agree with your point about not fearing change, I disagree with the majority of this. I think it's smarter to address a potential issue before it becomes a problem, because once it's a problem (ie- once the group is going and now the player is still unhappy) it's more complicated to solve, doubly so if the DM still wants his "balanced" group. Two characters leaving the party after the story is started can be complicated and can result in contrived plot in order to justify it.

The issue is that the player is not only locked into a power source at this point, but because everybody else has already (at least it sounds like) made a character, they're also potentially locked into a role, as well. If they're locked into the Divine power source, at best they have three choices (if the role is leader, because there's PH1 Cleric, Warpriest, and Runepriest). Otherwise the player is pretty much being told what to play.

This is why these types of restrictions are a bad idea. When I started up my group, I did make the suggestion that "Hey it'd be cool if everybody played a different power source" but I didn't push the issue. I wound up with two divines, one arcane, one psionic, one primal, and one martial, and it worked out just fine.

I wouldn't ask anybody in particular to switch, I would just state my desire to not fill the single gap that exists, and only then if I just couldn't get excited about a potential character in the given power source. It's a group game, and to a point the group is responsible for the group's fun. If everybody claimed a power source before you had a chance to even discuss it with everybody, I would just tell the DM that I really don't want to play the only remaining power source.

Of course, if all other roles are covered, you could just throw a wrench in the DMs plans while following the spirit of the request and play an Assassin.
#12
thiotes
Oct 08, 2011 16:09:15 Don't you like the power source classes or the power source implication of serving a deity?

I'm not into the pious sort either, so when i play divine characters, they usually only have a distant relationship to their god.

Like my current Cavalier, who was saved by worshippers of Bahamut, so to start a new life he joined them. He doesn't know **** about religion. He knows the main tenets and agrees with them, but not because he follows bahamut, but because he personally thinks they're right.

If you have problem with the divine fluff, just think of something to remove you from that whole prayer system.

Post/Author/DateTime	Post
#1 Pyrate_Jib Oct 06, 2011 10:10:54	New D&D game is starting up and you are super excited! You and your friends are creating characters for the campaign. Emails, Facebook messages, and text messages are flying about between friends in anticipation of the game. The DM has created a fantastic setting and has put in a lot of creative time in the design. The DM has only one request when it comes to creating PCs, one from each of the main power group settings (Arcane, Martial, Divine, Primal, and Psionic). However when you arrive you discover that everyone else has claimed the power sources that you enjoy playing and classes you like. Only Divine remains (insert whatever class/ power source you do not like to play it doesn't matter). You've played those characters before and you just can't get into it. You had hoped to play (insert class) and considered (insert class) but now you are stuck. The beautiful thing about 4E is you can still Multi-class or Duel class which helps. If you are stuck playing a Divine class you can still create an Invoker/ Wizard and get something close to what you wanted originally. Of course that may leave the party slightly weaker in that power source but it dovetails with the DMs request. I had a buddy who hated playing Fighters but would most likely jump at playing a Warlock Multi-class Fighter. Of course there are other options. Trying to get a friend to switch with you. Asking the DM for an exception. Perhaps leaving the group. What course of action would you take and why?
#2 Cohen95 Oct 06, 2011 10:18:18	"Hey guys, I don't really like playing (Power Source), and was kind of hoping to play (Power Source) or (Power Source). Is that okay with you, DM?" If the DM says okay, cool, game on. If the DM says no, bail. The DM is actively preventing you from playing a game the way you want to play it, and there's no point in playing a game you won't enjoy.
#3 slobo777a Oct 06, 2011 11:55:14	Depends on how restrictive you want to go. We were short a Leader in my current game, and I had a lot of trouble coming up with Leader classes I'd enjoy. Being further restricted to single power source would have broken it for me. I would say my compromise in this kind of senario would be to make the restrictions on myself as minimal as possible: Ignore the party's role mix, think out of the box for races and perhaps as the OP suggests, hybrids. In short, try to make the DM's story plan work. If I was still unhappy with teh resulting character I would say so, and ask the DM (first) and rest of group (second) if there was anything they wanted to compromise on so I could have fun. I don't like using "well I won't play then" as an ultimatum, but then I also have friends I can talk to, and I have never found them unreasonable. The example given (one of each power source) makes for a fragile campaign, because it is very difficult for a player to retire or lose a character and come back with something different. Games I have played in with up-front character build restrictions like this include low-metal worlds (less kit for some classes), and one where all the PCs had to hit a ceratin bonus to Stealth. Both were fun to play in, if a little skewed balance-wise between classes.
#4 GelatinousOctahedron Oct 06, 2011 12:27:38	Class, race, and role restrictions are fine if everyone is onboard with them and if they allow some player choice. And if someone really didn't want to play a power source, race, roll, or whatever DMs should generally not try to force PCs into one. Some limits are fine, but the player needs to be able to have a decent number of choices and the DM and other players need to be willing to compromise. Its one thing if a player is demanding to play some bizzare concept that doesn't fit into the world, but that is not the case discribed here. We play power source and race restrictions campagins in my in person group a lot, but everyone is on board with them. Sometimes the DM will say one person can opt out like when we once did an all elf campaign and my previous PC had been an elf so he let me play something else. We have done all psionic for both 3.5 and 4th, all martial and primal human, all elf, and in his homebrew ones we could pick from 2 or 3 power sources and a list of about 6 races for each campaign.
#5 salla Oct 06, 2011 16:57:19	"Hey guys, I don't really like playing (Power Source), and was kind of hoping to play (Power Source) or (Power Source). Is that okay with you, DM?" If the DM says okay, cool, game on. If the DM says no, bail. The DM is actively preventing you from playing a game the way you want to play it, and there's no point in playing a game you won't enjoy. This. Those kinds of things should be discussed among all players and agreed upon unanimously, not a sudden DM drop, and they definitely shouldn't have started divvying stuff up without you there! It's hard for me to determine what I'd do, because I can't imagine my group doing this without my input and/or presence. Man, that was just freakin' rude ... Honestly, I can be pretty spiteful, so I'd probably just play what I wanted, take a Multiclass Divine feat and then by-and-large forget about it.
#6 Pyrate_Jib Oct 07, 2011 13:26:08	How would you react to a Player asking you to switch roles with him because he prefers a certain class? Say one Player always favors Rangers with the ranged longbow martial path. You figured you give a Ranger Beastmaster a try only to discover he wants to play the same thing yet again. Would you help a brother out and switch to a Divine role so he can play what he wants or encourage him to branch out and try something new?
#7 salla Oct 07, 2011 14:05:45	How would you react to a Player asking you to switch roles with him because he prefers a certain class? Say one Player always favors Rangers with the ranged longbow martial path. You figured you give a Ranger Beastmaster a try only to discover he wants to play the same thing yet again. Would you help a brother out and switch to a Divine role so he can play what he wants or encourage him to branch out and try something new? Ignoring for a moment that I wouldn't play a Beastmaster Ranger if you paid me ... Normal Game: A lot of it would depend on what he's wanting to switch with and for, really. If someone reallllly likes playing one thing, well, that's his business. I'd probably not change, though, as I can't imagine many parties being upset with having two Rangers (because that means stuff dies faster). I'd probably work with him to vary our skillsets and such (he trains Nature, I train Dungoneering, and so forth). Your 'Unique Power Source game': I don't care for divine characters much, myself, but I could probably suck it up provided I was going to play a cleric (I like the Leader role so much that I'm willing to play a cleric). Otherwise, like above, I'd just play whatever I want and slap a divine MC feat on it and call it a day.
#8 Cohen95 Oct 07, 2011 23:02:48	How would you react to a Player asking you to switch roles with him because he prefers a certain class? Say one Player always favors Rangers with the ranged longbow martial path. You figured you give a Ranger Beastmaster a try only to discover he wants to play the same thing yet again. Would you help a brother out and switch to a Divine role so he can play what he wants or encourage him to branch out and try something new? What Salla said wrt Beastmasters, but to answer your general question, Probably. I try to have a few different ideas stewing, and they're often pretty different from each other, so if someone was dead-set on, say, playing a controller, and I was already thinking about it, I'd probably switch up and play something else, to keep things balanced. My first rule of D&D is "Play what you will enjoy playing."
#9 Macabre13 Oct 08, 2011 2:57:00	How would you react to a Player asking you to switch roles with him because he prefers a certain class? Say one Player always favors Rangers with the ranged longbow martial path. You figured you give a Ranger Beastmaster a try only to discover he wants to play the same thing yet again. Would you help a brother out and switch to a Divine role so he can play what he wants or encourage him to branch out and try something new? I'd probably not switch. "You've run this character every single time, dude. Try something else so one of us can do it instead," basically. I couldn't recommend bailing on your gaming group just because you can't have your way with every single thing. Man up and try a new class before you go trying to switch everything around or quitting or whatever. You might have fun. Nobody would have asked for any of the songs in Guitar Hero 2 but it's totally got the best set list (before they just released everything ever for download but whatever). Guitar Hero 3 was basically design-by-request and was a pile of garbage. Point being, you might be surprised by what you find when you're handed something you never asked for. They probably shouldn't have done it all behind your back, but what's done is done. You can either cry about it or work with it. If you really hate Paladins and Clerics and...what's left Avengers? I dunno, doesn't matter, but if you hate them after giving them an honest whirl, then feel free make a valid fuss instead of an "I fear change" fuss.
#10 Krusk Oct 08, 2011 9:29:47	It sounds like you are forced to play a divine class? Play a runepriest, they are basically not even divine. The descriptions sound more arcane if you have to pick an existing power source, but really they seem like their own source altogether. I think I would be able to find at least one build from any power source I would enjoy, but I would also think one player would have been willing to trade with you. It also sounds like you pretty much only play bow rangers, to which I say "stop". My friend drags her husband no one likes to our games pretty often. He always plays a dwarven fighter. Not only does that mean he is always the same thing, but it really gets annoying when we have to say "Well we already have a defender, so I will try to play something else to balance the party" or better yet "Hey [husband] we could really use a striker" "well I was really into a dwarven fighter this time, so Im going to do that". "Sweet, we don't need a striker anyway, combat in 4e really flies by.". Don't be a dwarf fighter this game. Go ahead and give a dwarf paladin a shot. Its slightly different, but pretty similar. Or maybe a dragonborn fighter. slowly branch out, and try something similar but new.
#11 Cohen95 Oct 08, 2011 10:56:31	How would you react to a Player asking you to switch roles with him because he prefers a certain class? Say one Player always favors Rangers with the ranged longbow martial path. You figured you give a Ranger Beastmaster a try only to discover he wants to play the same thing yet again. Would you help a brother out and switch to a Divine role so he can play what he wants or encourage him to branch out and try something new? I'd probably not switch. "You've run this character every single time, dude. Try something else so one of us can do it instead," basically. I couldn't recommend bailing on your gaming group just because you can't have your way with every single thing. Man up and try a new class before you go trying to switch everything around or quitting or whatever. You might have fun. Nobody would have asked for any of the songs in Guitar Hero 2 but it's totally got the best set list (before they just released everything ever for download but whatever). Guitar Hero 3 was basically design-by-request and was a pile of garbage. Point being, you might be surprised by what you find when you're handed something you never asked for. They probably shouldn't have done it all behind your back, but what's done is done. You can either cry about it or work with it. If you really hate Paladins and Clerics and...what's left Avengers? I dunno, doesn't matter, but if you hate them after giving them an honest whirl, then feel free make a valid fuss instead of an "I fear change" fuss. While I can certainly agree with your point about not fearing change, I disagree with the majority of this. I think it's smarter to address a potential issue before it becomes a problem, because once it's a problem (ie- once the group is going and now the player is still unhappy) it's more complicated to solve, doubly so if the DM still wants his "balanced" group. Two characters leaving the party after the story is started can be complicated and can result in contrived plot in order to justify it. The issue is that the player is not only locked into a power source at this point, but because everybody else has already (at least it sounds like) made a character, they're also potentially locked into a role, as well. If they're locked into the Divine power source, at best they have three choices (if the role is leader, because there's PH1 Cleric, Warpriest, and Runepriest). Otherwise the player is pretty much being told what to play. This is why these types of restrictions are a bad idea. When I started up my group, I did make the suggestion that "Hey it'd be cool if everybody played a different power source" but I didn't push the issue. I wound up with two divines, one arcane, one psionic, one primal, and one martial, and it worked out just fine. I wouldn't ask anybody in particular to switch, I would just state my desire to not fill the single gap that exists, and only then if I just couldn't get excited about a potential character in the given power source. It's a group game, and to a point the group is responsible for the group's fun. If everybody claimed a power source before you had a chance to even discuss it with everybody, I would just tell the DM that I really don't want to play the only remaining power source. Of course, if all other roles are covered, you could just throw a wrench in the DMs plans while following the spirit of the request and play an Assassin.
#12 thiotes Oct 08, 2011 16:09:15	Don't you like the power source classes or the power source implication of serving a deity? I'm not into the pious sort either, so when i play divine characters, they usually only have a distant relationship to their god. Like my current Cavalier, who was saved by worshippers of Bahamut, so to start a new life he joined them. He doesn't know **** about religion. He knows the main tenets and agrees with them, but not because he follows bahamut, but because he personally thinks they're right. If you have problem with the divine fluff, just think of something to remove you from that whole prayer system.