Some basic discussion of what the adventure or campaign is going to be about is of course necessary. A full-social adventure with a party of dedicated murder hobos won't work. But if the characters fit mostly within the requirements of the adventure then everything else can be adjusted. Let's say the GM wants to do an adventure where the characters will investigate a murder of a member of the city council, which will lead into uncovering and fighting a cult that is infiltrating the city's upper echelons. The players are only told that the adventure will involve investigation, combat, and high society interaction. The players come up with a detective, a brawny priest, and a politician who likes dueling. So they've got the investigative and social skills, the priest and politician do reasonably well in combat, the priest can even provide some healing, but there's no ranged firepower and nobody can break into anything. The GM can tailor the adventure to match that; there's no need for anyone to redesign their character so that the party can engage flying enemies or obtain evidence from a locked room. Likewise, if the party were to consist of three wizards from the local college, the adventure could still work. One of the players is suggested to hold a teaching position at the college to provide social clout, one should ideally have some experience with investigation or political scheming, everyone is recommended to keep Mage Armor prepared, and the cult now favors ranged combat. The plot might move a bit slower because of less plentiful healing opportunities and frequent rests. All of this assumes a GM who primarily wants to work with the players to tell a story. If the GM wants to do an unforgiving grind where the players will need to use every advantage (in and out of game) to survive, this won't fly. Bring an optimized roster or perish. (Of course, most unforgiving GMs I know won't allow magical healing so that character injuries actually mean something.) I probably wouldn't join that game but some people roll like that. On the whole, I don't find it that goofy when characters die in combat. At least not goofier than when parties always just happen to consist of people whose skills perfectly complement each other, especially ones that form by happenstance.

> The didn’t listen when the GM talked about Theme and mood and end up with a character who doesn’t fit with the party/canpaign Hah, for a second I thought this was my own post because I wrote something very similar here. But yes, this is one that bugs me.

The idea that players all make their characters in isolation and just show up on session 0 with them sounds like such a recipe for disaster. I know it can work sometimes, much like "just grab four things from the fridge and throw them into the soup" can work sometimes. But sometimes you get like gummy bear pizza bites with shrimp and mayo topping. I think a lot of games that came after D&D figured out solutions to common problems, but D&D insists on staying kind of archaic.

From the title I thought this was going to be about personal computers and upon opening the image I was very confused for a second. No, I don't look at what community the post is from when I'm scrolling all.

Me and my best friend played halfling twin brawlers one time who would use each other as improvised weapons and crawl in big guys Shadow if the Colossus style. It was the most fun thing ever, but the DM turned out to be the “if someone doesn’t lose a limb during every encounter I have failed” kind of DM so it didn’t last long.

Yeah ime players tell the gm what they've decided to play when they know and the understanding is they pick something that works with everything else. Or we all decide what we're playing collaboratively, that way if we're all squishy controllers at least it's on purpose

DM assigned specialness is different and often really fun. I've played a few "mystery backstory" games those are really fun, especially the one where we had to figure out even our class

I don't hate D&D, but I did notice how much harder combat gets from DM's side to prepare, and also how much more bored of it the players are. My players started doing everythign to spend more sessions on their own shenanigans, character moments, roleplay and NPC interactions. The thing is we love our campaign and characters, but are too high level to switch systems. So we're taking break to play short Mage: the Ascension campaign. I am now learnign two different new systems, Mage and WFRP, pray for me.

One I did was "joke character who ended up being very serious."

You are aware that most of DnDs mechanics are focused on simulating fights? If you do not like that, you are maybe playing the wrong system. Beyond that, how are you totally useless in combat? All classes get combat-abilities in one way or another and are designed to be at least moderately useful.

The answer is simple : I don’t play DnD. Mostly Naheulbeuk (where the fights are hilarious so I don’t mind) and call of Cthulhu (where fighting often just kills you immediately anyway)

I think of myself as the chaos engine that drives the plot forward. Everyone else in the party would just sit and talk plans forever if I wasn't out here rolling death-saves.

A former foot soldier in the crusades who had a panicked war horse fall on his legs in a skirmish somewhere on the way to Antioch and was left behind in Bulgaria by a retreating supply train on his way back. His shattered leg never healed well and he is in constant pain he has mostly learned to live with, does not speak the language and is edging out a small existence as a gravedigger in a bigger city, dragging his twisted limb through rain-soaked earth, muttering prayers in a foreign dialect to saints no one there worships. Somewhere between Neutral Good and Neutral Bitter, depending on the day. I know it is a bit hammy.