Roasting myself for a bad D&D take 

She enjoyed the concept of character growth so much she used herself as an example.

As a 1E veteran who played through the Satanic Panic, the best roleplaying advice I got from a DM was his Rule 0: Everyone has fun. My advice shouldn't hold anymore weight than someone who just started playing. Once you get the game, it's your game. Play the game you want to play.

genuinely learned a TON from this video. I hope we can stay on this trend of self accountability, it's super healthy and can also help others learn more as well. Also I'm jealous of your ability to properly structure a video.

Optimize the themed build. That’s the most fun IMO. In other words, start with a concept, and then try to make it good.

‘This has made a lot of people very mad was widely registered as a bad move’ Love the hitchhiker guide/restaurant at the end of the universe reference

The biggest compliment I ever got from my DM was him sending me a comic that depicted 3 types of Players, one who optimized their character, one who got really deep into the roleplay and one who would make their characters with built in jokes and told me "somehow, I think you're all 3". Made me feel super accomplished as a Character Designer and Player.

0:06: "This has made a lot of people very angry, and been widely regarded as a bad move." I see what you did there...

Ginny, as one of the *really* Old Guard--I worked at TSR beginning in 1978 as an editor and designer and was one of the editors for the 1st Edition DMG and Deities & Demigods--I watched your first MinMax video and found nothing wrong with it. Indeed, starting with the Original 3 booklets of D&D, the die rolls in order dictated your character choices, but then your role-play could take over--and there was enough character death that you'd eventually get to play everything! We used 3x5 index cards for character sheets (and marching order tokens until we could afford enough miniatures), and encumbrance was self-limiting--what you could write on the back of the card! So yes, we OG were flexible--and one of my characters with terrible rolls was played so desperately and inventively (ahem!) by me that he eventually landed in TSR's Rogues' Gallery product. The character had a low Con, low HP rolls, and had 3 hit points at 3rd Level! All of your points today are valid. It's truly a value-added game--what you put in will usually control the amount of fun you get out of it. I'm in a campaign now with a couple of Min-Maxers who do like to ramble on about how if I had chosen X spell or feat, I could have done a point more damage--but I'm having more fun playing my Halfling Dex Barbarian with two short swords (Just give me a toss and I'm Death From Above!!) than they are ("Is it time to hit something yet?"). So keep on keeping on--I enjoy your videos and songs and if you ever hit the "middle" cons I guest at (Gamehole-Madison, WI; GaryCon --Lake Geneva, WI; North Texas RPGCon--Dallas, TX) I'd love to see you, have you play in one of one of my games/play in yours, and definitely chat about ren faires etc over beers! Best, Allen Hammack (Ghost Tower of Inverness)

Seeing Ginny in glasses and her hair tied back makes me realise that I would fall for the Clark Kent disguise if Superman were a real person.

Really big of you to go back and address this (as opposed to just delete/ignore this). I did think that you made some good points in the previous video, most pertinent of which is don't be afraid to do something that's not optimal in the interest of rp. Don't thinks the old video is completely invalid, but interesting to see how to developed over the past two years. (Also most importantly... your eye makeup is absolutely FIRE in this video).

D&D has been my passion since I was 7 and I’m 51. I’m now living the dream as a successful, full time, paid DM. For me, you can’t go wrong as long as you are having fun that is not at the expense of anyone else at the table and you are genuinely committed to telling a story together. How you build your character should simply follow that guideline and you’ll generally be ok. The other thing you need to do is communicate with your group and DM if there is even a hint of a question. “Hey DM, I know this is a combat heavy campaign, but will my grossly underpowered build, built on diplomacy cause a problem?” Or, “I know this is super heavy RP, but my character is quiet and combat starved.” Just ask questions. Not everyone has a play style that works together. Communication keeps games alive. I’ve seen it so many times over that last 40+ years. I’m SUPER picky about who I play with and ask a lot of questions at session 0. It’s served me very well.

I really appreciate that you made a correction video. Not a lot of people take the time or have the courage to admit they were wrong in the past so thoroughly. You earned my respect for that.

Maybe a better initial message would have been along the lines of: "Don't *stress* over optimization, when you're new to the game, and everyone else at your table is also finding their way. Do it, if that's where you find your fun, but don't feel obligated to do it. You'll possibly choose new directions with later characters, building on what you learn in the meantime."

"If you cringe at your past self, you're growing!" Introspective videos like this are educational and fun!

Both Hamlet and Macbeth would totally be "Optimized characters" if roleplayed! The difference is that in both of their stories, their strengths BECOME their flaws... but if Macbeth and Hamlet were to swap places and play through eachother's campaigns, they would become Champions, instead of tragedies!

As someone who saw the Stormwind Fallacy get unveiled, honestly I found your old video to also be helpful to people who were stuck in a rut on optimization. Sometimes people just get too obsessed with charops. That said, this video is also very refreshing to hear, and I think I just love both takes. In the end, D&D advice is often contradictory, because there's no one true correct approach, there are only chisels that get us closer to some ideal we have at the time of play.

A comment on optimizing at a non-optimizer table: one of the best pieces of advice I've seen on that front is to optimize a support character. It sucks for the rest of your group if you're taking everything out, but if *they're* taking everything out using your buffs [or heals or whatever], that feels good for other players while still letting you make a relatively absurd character.

"My hair is clearly green now!" I literally laughed out loud at this one. I saw it coming from a mile away and it still made me laugh!

What, people evolving, maturing in terms of experience with something, changing their minds, and admitting it publicly? This still exists in today's world? *sheds a tear* I thought we had lost the art of being reasonable, looking at the state of the world nowadays. Thanks Ginny for putting a smile in my face ^_^

As someone who is totally new to this hobby, I appreciate you explaining the debate and making a good case for the pros and cons of each style. It's so helpful to have a nuanced discussion. :)

My buddy L was one of my favorite people to play with, he’d show up every time with an optimized character, and roleplay the hell out of it. Truly that’s what broke the storm wind fallacy for me, once I could see that the only person hyper ready for roleplay at my table while I was dming was also the min maxer, and he really just wanted his character to consistently do the things he liked hence the maximization.

When talking about Min-Maxing, a lot of people seems to forget about the "Min" part. A perfectly optimised character has, thanks to the skill point system, flaws, or at least things they can't do. A Fighter can't do magic (unless Eldritch Knight), a Wizard can't melee (as well as a Fighter). A party needs balance.

this is really appreciated. my favorite character i've ever played was a min-max'd Phoenix Sorcerer back when it was still an experimental sub-class.... he by FAR carried the party when it came to pure damage output, and if not led the charge in most non-combat scenarios, was extremely USEFUL in almost any.... but even with a damn near perfect set of skills ON PAPER for the campaign, he was also by far the most FLAWED character in that campaign, and his personality growth throughout the story has left large marks and echoes throughout our table's extended universe, for better AND worse. he was an impulsive, research and loot obsessed man with a bad habit of accidentally starting large fires before ANYTHING had started, with a FIERCE loyalty to anyone he considered a friend (which turned out to be anyone who didn't just attack him on sight). by the end of the campaign he had managed to free an 'evil' god and redeem them within the eyes of the world, re-connected the elemental planes that had been blocked from the world, the myriad of pets (a Mimic and 3 Rust Monsters among them) he'd found along the way have grown into benevolent paragons of their respective races, guarding and protecting the descendants of every friend he'd made along the way, and eventually ascended to god-hood in his own right, all the while dragging his entire party along with him, but all of the large and great successes he had were built upon a MOUNTAIN of failures, blood, sweat and tears. he had willfully thrown himself into the path of what would otherwise be certain death countless times to save his party because despite all of his pride, ego, intelligence and everything else, he was ultimately a scared child, terrified of losing the people he cared about, even for a MOMENT. (my favorite moment will always be him single-handedly taking aggro for a max damage cast of Meteor Swarm by dragging the caster as far from the party as he could within one turn, which with a mixture of clever meta magic uses and teleportation, along with movement enhancements, managed to get out of the mile range, and then take all 3 meteors directly to the face totaling at 360 damage to his 60-odd hp, as he knew he was the only party member with a HOPE of surviving that sort of damage, due to being able to revive himself)

One of my DMs made the point that “the best” character build is the one you enjoy playing. I’m playing a Wizard/Fighter multi class because it seemed interesting rather than being optimized.

For what it's worth, I really like your "bubbly preschool teacher energy." Your advice in that old video could be reframed, granted, but there is value in the underlying message that playing something outside your comfort zone is a way to grow as a player and as a person, and there's absolutely nothing wrong with optimizing for story at the expense of mechanics if that's what you're into.

Wow. She actually pulled no punches on herself. I was actually moved by how brutally honest she was about herself. Very courageous. Subscribed

You are a good role model in many ways, and your stance towards acknowledging past mistakes or even being open to changing your mind as you learn new things is a big one. You keep that pre-school teacher energy going, girl! You are a smile-inducing fresh breeze and we love you for it

One of the key aspects of finding a good, intelligent person is finding someone who can learn from their mistakes and openly discuss it.

This feels like a real self analysis, not just reading a statement to get it over with, but real, reasoned, point by point explanations.

As a member of "the Old Guard" it was REALLY hard to optimize when you are randomly generating your stats by rolling 3d6 in order. But inevitably rolling below average in half of your stats really forced you to play a character with Flaws, which actually DOES encourage roleplaying.

I've DMed and played a lot of DnD for the past six years, and if there's one thing that holds true is that there is never only one solution to any problem you encounter. Thinking outside the box - better if you can do it in the context of the character - is one of the best skills you can develop, because you might lack the AB to hit that golem with AC 40, but knowing to ask the material of the pillars around the room and plan a coordinated distraction with a localized charge in the right moment will do wonders. I cannot stress enough how important it is to consider every tool at your disposal. Every last implication of a needle in your inventory, every last loose piece of rubble on the floor, every combination of words of noises you could possibly utter that may change the course of the battle. Everything that surrounds you is a resource, from your abiltiies to the tragic backstory of your friendly dwarven engineer, and knowing where they fit is the largest puzzle far more important to solve than any mechanical conundrum. Because having a barbarian with some 24 nat STR may do absolutely nothing at all when fighting a construct that is entirely immune to physical attacks.... but you can always ask your engineer if they know the schematics and what's the closest thing to an off switch that you can flip.

That's definitely the lesson to learn, different sorts of character optimisation for different sorts of campaigns. Yes, sometimes a non-optimal character is the best choice but other times severe optimisation is also what's called for.

As a part of that AD&D group who's been doing this for 30+ years. I had no real problem with your original video. Then again, I understood the underlying premise of your original video and was more than willing to overlook the mechanical weaknesses in your delivery. You make good content.

The lesson I took away from the previous video was, “Don’t let Optimization prevent you from playing the character you want.” I framed this through a conversation that I had with another player at my table. We were discussing a character he was wanting to create. We had the overarching concept of the character and were trying to find matching mechanics. As we had nailed down his player’s class I suggested a specific race (don’t remember which one) and he goes, “Ehh but (that class) doesn’t really go with (that race). I was confused by this because, if it fit with the character, who cares? We were a table of noobs with an experienced and godly patient DM, no one expected us to come to the table with perfect builds. I don’t typically minmax, simply because I’m too new in this community to understand the mechanics that well so I’ve personally enjoyed leaning into the kooky builds, but there are also parts of my builds that are optimized too. I don’t think it’s good to say one ought to be one or the other.

You are EXACTLY the type of young person i enjoy listening to. Self-reflective, humble and intelligent.

I'm pretty sure the original video is the reason I subscribed to your channel, so it's really interesting to see you coming back to it. Congratulations on your progress, it's really nice to see you coming back and fixing your past mistakes

"I don't wanna be the kind of person who doesn't change my mind when I learn new things." - clearly the best message here. And this can go for some truly ugly/dark/inappropriate thoughts as well. If you've changed, and it is for the better, good.

I just love ppl who can publicly say "Yo, I messed up. Let me correct myself." One more reason to have you as my favorite d&d mentor :D

I really hate when I ask about a player's character and all i get is a race/class/level breakdown. I'm all like, "ok, but what do they feel, think or dream?" If you can get a character that is an actual character, and not just a stat sheet, then you got it right. It's a bonus if they're optimised

I'm an old school guy. Been DMing for 30+ years. I like your blue/green/whatever hair and preschool teacher energy. Keep it up. This particular grognard is thrilled that you and your millennial friends have brought new enthusiasm and ideas to my beloved hobby. More power to you.

In this day and age, hearing someone say "I was wrong, let me correct myself" is the single most wonderful thing in the world. Never change, you green haired weird person on the internet!

Regarding interesting characters, I absolutely love playing a very standard and typical race/class combo, because I find that the race and class take a back seat. That doesn't necessarily mean they're better or worse, of course. An unusual race/class combo can give you a really strong anchor to your character, while the supposedly bland human fighter combo is a blank canvas on which you can paint almost anything you want.

I appreciate a lot about this video: conversational content, the presentation, the editing, the spine it took to openly evaluate your past self-but I also want to say I liked her Interpretive Dance announcer’s tied back hair look 😇

The example i always use for Stormwinds Fallacy is a character i once rolled named Juan Jane (syllabic switch of John Wayne), a fighter crossbow/sharpshooter build. Those that are familiar with min/maxing will probably already be familiar with crossbow expert/sharpshooter as being one of the highest DPR builds that can be made at 6th level in 5e, basically the poster child build of min/maxing. Because the build is fairly complete without the subclass, and all the subclass really adds to the build is utility, its pretty open ended what can be chosen there, usually eldritch knight or battle master. Because Tasha's Cauldron had just released and our DM bought it when i made this build, I chose one of the new sub-classes: Rune Knight. I played the character like a spaghetti western cowboy gunslinger with all the mannerisms and prone to saying corny catchphrases. For flavor, and also because they seemed like the best options, for Rune Knight runes, I chose Cloud rune and Stone rune, and affixed them to my pistols (mechanically, crossbows, but for flavor, 6 shooter pistols), named the pistols Liberty (cloud rune) and Justice (stone rune). One of the corny catchphrases was, after killing an enemy, "Liberty and Justice for All" *blows smoke from gun barrels, twirls them around and re-holsters them* Point is, min/maxing doesn't have to look like "cardboard cutout of guy with 2 hand crossbows and no personality or intrigue beyond doing good damage" Get creative. There's a good reason the "background" section of character creation adds very little mechanically.

"Bubbly preschool teacher energy" is a really spot on way to describe you, and I definitely mean that as a compliment. The vibe is part of the reason why I subscribed.

I recently got into d&d after only playing a little in the past and your original video actually helped me understand there is no wrong way to build a character [which i was told there was] so it actually gave me the confidence to get back into it so it's still a win in my book

what a lucky gal to make a living doing what you love on youtube! With great power comes great responsibility, and Im so glad that I get to watch someone so deserving of their position as a popular video maker! What an amazing video!

I like both rp and optimization! When building a character I like to pick who the character is first, and then use that as a theme or guide to the Stat building aspect. I had a sparky lightning infused character.... So if there were spells that were not lightning, thunder, or wind based, then I couldn't use it... Or I would ask the dm if I could flavor another spell after my theme. It worked really well! Can't wait for the fall when I can play some more with my next crazy character.!

There are very few people with the introspection and emotional intelligence to not only realize this, but make a video publically calling it out. Genuine character building 100%

Wait, someone on the internet can change their mind after becoming more experienced?? Madness!! Actually, I give you a lot of points to redo a video that you feel was, done from a biased or at least less experienced point of view. That being said, and since I just commented on said video, I stand by my comment. My thoughts were not that maximized characters had no interesting backgrounds but that a character doesn’t have to be maximized to be a solid team member. Thank you for showing that we evolve as we grow and our opinions don’t always have to stay the same. Love seeing this as well as all your opinions and thoughts on the game. In the end, we all want the same thing. To have fun with our characters and our friends.

I love you made an update on your past vids. Shows you’re growing and learning, you don’t need to show it and I personally don’t expect it but I 100% appreciate it because I love to learn and grow too.

This is one of the best deconstructions of this common misconception I have ever seen. You've earned a subscriber and I will be sending this to people as a great thinkpiece on the Stormwind Fallacy in the future. Kudos on your growth!

A really awesome perspective! There really isn’t a “right” or “wrong”, what really matters is everyone at the table has an enjoyable experience. I’m DMing a great combination of seasoned veterans that min/max with incredible artistry, and others that are learning D&D and just like to create cool stuff. It’s finding that balance so everyone feels like a hero during the game, and no one feels left out during a challenge. Right now I’m developing homebrew feats that will give sub optimised players some extra kick, but also offer some lateral gains to the epically min/max’ed players (so they don’t feel left out for making efficient PC’s) Note I’ve got 2 Battle master crossbow sharpshooters and a brutally defensive evocation wizard sprinkled with some wonderfully crazy multi-classes!

Me near the start of this video: "She started playing in 2019 and thinks she's been playing a while? Oh, you sweet summer child." Me by the end: "I had no idea what the Stormwind fallacy was until today." Goes to show, you can always learn - even from the younglings. From a veteran of every edition, well done Ginny D.

Just for context, I started playing back in the 70's with Basic (just for the record, 2nd edition AD&D is still my favorite). Now I DM for my grandkids. I actually agree with points from both your old and new vids. Point is I have played with Min/Maxers that just don't role-play at all. They multi-class/duel-class to get perks/feats they want, they don't even bother with having a character background, they just want to do max damage and move on to the next critter the DM throws at them. Thing is I prefer to play with people that are role-playing (even if they are bad at it), and I myself get into my role-playing also, but I have noted that many M/M's don't role-play at all, or will do the bare minimum. Not true for all M/M's, but in my experience most have no interest in RP, and are thus boring to play with. As far as having character designed weaknesses, I actually like that. It's easier to add 'character' to a character with just a weakness of some sort built in that is not stat related. For example a character that will never drink a potion they themselves didn't make because they were poisoned once, etc. These just add flavor to a character and is something a M/M would never do. Which in general (not always) makes M/M players just boring IMO.

Min-Maxing gets conflated with people who play DnD "To win" because one always does the other, but not visa-versa.

Due to Satanic Panic in the 80s/90s we embraced RP and storytelling so ppl/teachers wouldn't see the dice/books but we wanted to feel powerful because we weren't. We often argued these points as kids and I didn't see any issues with your video. We were happy trying to get anyone to play with us and maybe all the art wasn't inclusive but our imaginations were. You want to optimize? The DM has to optimize. A certain level of balance needs to be maintained. You can't imagine wrong. The only way to fail at having fun is when people aren't having fun.

I was shook to learn that "The Stormwind Fallacy" didn't have a single thing to do with Tiberius' fuck ups.

Gianni rolled a nat 20 on her wisdom save. It takes amazing courage and insight to admit mistakes. Well done and thank you for showing us how to grow. Great example!

Some of the most fun I've ever had playing DnD is with a Goblin Swashbuckler that would literally do whatever someone he liked told him to do and an Aarakocra Arcane Archer that was essentially the babysitter of a bunch of not quite murderhobos. Now that being said the Swashbuckler was almost unhittable by anything with average stats and the Arcane Archer could roll 25s on hit checks pretty consistently (with the help of an Oathbow)

I think this really shows how you've grown and changed as a player. I can see how being told your character is built poorly would make a relatively new player react in that kind of way, I know my first few characters were mostly tieflings because I was obsessed with that race and the other players would really try to push me to play other races in a not so constructive way (despite the fact that they all had favourite races that they didn't really explore that far out from, but that's besides the point) but honestly I just love the tiefling race and would happily only play tieflings if I had the chance. When I saw your original video at first, I was pretty new as well, and I remember it resonated with me a far bit at the time, but for me it definitely came more from a place of feeling frustrated with having players in my group who would sometimes make fun of me for the kinds of characters I would build, so I guess looking back now I was more so relating to your issue with people complaining about your character not being correctly optimised than anything else. Now I've had the chance to DM a year long game, plus a couple one shots, and dipping my toes in to other systems, I'm more of the opinion that min maxing is fine, but being rude towards other players because they chose to build a character in a certain way is not, and because of that I find I'm a lot more selective with who I play with and who I run games for (since back then I would literally just play in any game that would take me lol). I think as a player it's fine to give advice to other players on how they can improve their characters, but if they don't want to accept that advice, that's okay too. As a DM/GM though, I try to spend a decent amount of time with my players to make sure they have characters that will fit in well with the world/game I want to run, but so long as it's something that fits in with the game and my players are respectful, I don't mind if they want to try something a bit unconventional. I will not stand for players bullying other players for building their characters 'wrong' though.

A saying comes to mind: Admitting past mistakes just means you are wiser today then you were yesterday. Kudos for being open to changing your mind and sharing that growth with your community.

Haven’t seen one of your videos in like a year! You’re getting soooo good at videos!

Okay, I'll admit, I'm usually one of those skip-through-the-sponsor-segment scumbags. But yours was on another level; Bravo.

Big time respect for making this. I always say to optimize as much as you find fun and reasonable. Fun is the most important one, you need to have a good time with the character, so picking spells that fit a play style or fantasy that you enjoy I’d important, even if it’s not optimal. Reasonable means you need to fit the vibe of the game. How tough is combat? How strong are the other players? Is there even combat at all? If you’re playing a particularly weak (or even extremely strong) character, that can put pressure on the game / the DM. Follow both rules and talk to both the DM and party while you’re building out the fantasy character of your dreams.

"This made a lot of people very angry and has been widely regarded as a bad move." I see you. I see what you did there.

Thank you for this! And good on you for growing and learning, and being honest and caring enough to address past mistakes, and using it as a learning lesson for us all, rather than shuffling it under the rug!

I REALLY like that you were able to go back and correct your mistakes. Not a lot of people do that at all, let alone people who make content. Great work! One thing I would like to specifically agree with though, is that it can be really tough for ALL the players in a group if one person is unoptimized and the rest are and vice versa, so I highly encourage DMs AND Players out there to figure out what is best for your group AND DM.

For me the most important thing you said is to look at what abilities actually do, rather than thier fluff. Once you (and your DM!) realise this character building gets much more fun and free.

Also, it's very interesting to play a combat-centric character In a party of social, exploratory characters. Case in point, Brock Samson from the Venture Brothers TV show. He is a complete veteran of combat that strikes fear into everyone he opposes. He is a terrifying whirlwind of death, and the rest of his group has almost zero combat abilities. He's the bodyguard for a famous scientist in his two goofy idiots sons. I think the more important thing is that everyone should have something that their character can do and that everyone enjoys. So maybe the combat characters have a bunch of minions to mow down, while all the social characters have some MacGuffin to chase down or wrestle out of the hands of an equally weak scientist while slapping each other.

My best friend and I have been going back and forth on the optimization/roleplay discussion for the better part of three decades now. We've discovered a lot from each other, and while we occasionally butt heads, we compliment each other pretty well, I think. We've both learned a lot about each others' character creation process and realized that for us, we end up at nearly the same place at the end despite taking radically different paths to get there. To lay it out: As I understand it from our conversations, he starts with a high level concept and then picks mechanical features that suit the concept of the character he's excited to make. For me, I find something mechanical that intrigues me, build the character up mechanically, and then look at what I've made at about 80% mechanically done (like, I still have a few spells or feats or whatever to decide; almost always since 5e this has included backgrounds, traits, bonds, etc with the sole exception of the first 5e wizard I made which I knew I wanted to be a charlatan from the first moment) and think about what this character would be like, what would have shaped them to have those attributes, etc; and then build the rest of the character with that in mind. I think that this comes down somewhat to our personalities - he is very much a fan of all sorts of literature and media and has a much more traditionally creative mind, while I tend towards the analytical side of thinking, where numbers help things make sense for me they get in the way of his enjoyment a lot of the time. (Re-reading the last 3 paragraphs, I think it might come off like I'm using the term "friend" ironically, but no, this man was my best man at my wedding and I expect if he didn't have a brother, I'd be his. We've played together since elementary school and are in our late 30s now. And I'll admit that I don't think anyone can have a friendship last that long without some issues along the way; we've had times where we weren't speaking to each other in frustration or anger, we've had periods where we didn't go 12 hours without chatting, but push comes to shove I'd trust the man with my life.) All that and the digression to say that I understand why it can look the way it does to some people, and why there's been this divide, and I think that if I wasn't also into the roleplaying side of things, my friend might still harbor that sentiment that there is necessarily a "roleplay vs rollplay" divide, as I know we both fell into that trap in our younger years.

Admitting when one is wrong and owning up to mistakes is both beautiful and admirable.

"We are all different people all through our lives and that's okay, that's good you've got to keep moving so long as you remember all the people that you used to be." -Matt Smith as 11th doctor.

I honestly find optimization to lead to more interesting characters (specifically when i do it as I have a specific way of making characters) I typically find a class I like a lot try to build it in the strongest way I can. Then I have a free prompt for my character just by what choices I chose. For example, I made a necromancer wizard but I wanted to make sure he got hit as little as possible, so I chose a dwarf to get medium armor proficiency to bump my ac up. That way when I cast shield I can push my ac to 21. As well as poison resistance. So I was left with a prompt of why a necromancer might occur in dwarven culture, for reasons other than generic ones. So I decided he wanted to build a massive undead workforce to protect his people's kingdom to make less life lost when the city was attacked, as well as have a workforce to haul minerals and resources long distances to increase their efficiency in the mines. And to have non living creatures to transport deadly and toxic materials. But he was banished from his kingdom for proposing the idea The build ended up giving me a prompt for making a character. Which is a way that may not work for everyone but it's one I like.

Thank you for this very calm, mature video addressing personal viewpoints which have changed over time. Brava. As an Optimizer who has spent many years being told that since I Optimize I "don't want to have fun," "must care more about numbers than people," or "don't care about the world and lore," I really appreciate what you've said here. I became an Optimizer because the table I learned to play D&D at (15 years ago) was a table of Optimizers. For the first few years I watched the others pull off devastating combos, god-like skill checks, and amazingly creative applications of their abilities and skills while I (building concept characters which seemed cool) could only follow along behind and try to help. Now, this was not a bad table - the other players (I still play regularly with this group) are open and helpful (if opinionated) and they never made me feel like my characters were useless or unwanted or told me I was holding them back or building characters "wrong." The Philosophy of Optimization I was taught was basically "we optimize for the sake of the party." When you build a character, try to make them excellent at what they do to benefit and support the party with whatever skills they have. Building melee DPS? Build a god of war to stand between the squishies and danger. Building support-specialist? Have high ranks in every skill you can get. Why yes, I DO speak eleven languages and have 10 ranks in Appraise. Building a healer? Become the literal font of life to bring the party back from a near TPK. Not to steal the spotlight or to show off, but so that you can boost the party through challenges in your given field. Your god of war will be useless at diplomacy and that's fine - that's the Charisma Monkey's job. Your Trapmonkey will be crap at combat and that's fine - no one else can pick locks. Your Bard has a quarter the HP of everyone else and that's fine - they can buff/debuff like a god. Party balance meant everyone was good at something, but we were good at different things. As a new player who struggled to keep up with 4-5 Optimized characters, I decided I was just going to have to, as we say, "git gud." I studied the handbooks. I looked up build guides and read long forums on build options. I built many, many practice characters and spent long hours on my own studying spells, skills, and abilities so I understood and could apply them better. And over a few years of work and regular gaming, I became a much better player. I could keep up with my original table and be soundly effective at other tables. Then, while playing at some of these other tables, I found myself being labeled a "min-maxer" and "power gamer" and told I was playing the game "wrong." I was confused. At this point, I had spent about seven years working hard to learn several gaming systems so I could play effectively in all of them. I always gave my characters quirks and backstories and tried to break the common stereotype molds. But then I would be told by a table of orphaned half-orc barbarians and brooding elf rangers with wolf companions that I was "power gaming" because I made my arcane trickster a human so I could get the extra feat. Well, uh, yeah. That feat will let me be better at disabling traps, which will benefit the whole party. Why does just being human make my character "boring"? My characters have never backstabbed or betrayed the party, never abandoned their comrades or kept valuable loot for themselves. I've lost characters saving party members and made sure my characters had solid backstory motivation to stick with the party no matter what. I've never scoffed at people for flavor builds and done my best to RP with them in keeping with their flavor. So as a player, it bothered me to be told I was playing "wrong" when I would Optimize my characters so I could be the most helpful and effective party member I could. I know a lot of people have had bad experiences with min-maxers who only care about looking awesome and want everything to be about them. But the thing is, bad players come in all flavors and it's important not to decide everyone who tends towards a certain playstyle must be a killjoy or a horrible person because of it. I applaud you for having the courage to address your own changes in viewpoint (on YT, no less!) and hope you have many happy years of gaming at great tables. TTRPG's are all about having fun with others!

As someone who comes from B/X back in the 80's - you are an amazing addition to our hobby and I always look forward to your insights! Coming back and changing an outlook on something is a great mind set and helps bring more people to the table. More people, more games - more fun!

This took introspection, integrity, good humor, and guts. Sincere respect.

"If you were good at everything, that would be really boring." Cleric-dipped Wizards sweating profusely rn

To provide an example, I was in a Curse of Strahd campaign where I was the only experienced player (we did have an experienced DM). No one gave a second thought to healing, so I thought I would take one for the team and built the healingst healer from healsville who every healed and optimized him as best I could. I thought going in that I was going to hate my character and be bored to tears, but I wanted to focus on teaching the other players and supporting their characters. Boy was I wrong. I made him a cleric of Sune, a wine connoisseur, and gave him the voice of a southern, old-timey lawyer. He was possibly the second-most fun character I've ever played, kept our party alive through two almost TPKs (the DM might have also had a hand in helping with one of them), and also somehow became the face of the party with only a 12 charisma. If I ever get the chance to play Süneil Cinderhair again, I'm taking it.

This video was my introduction to you and your channel. It's less and less common people admit they are wrong, and even less common to do it so gracefully and intelligently. You took the time to explain how and why you were wrong, and what you've learned since then. How can ya not give a sub after that?! Aside from that, great vid! I like what you're doing, hope to see more of it soon.

The thing about the 3.5 generation of players being so uptight about optimisation is that, in 3.5 you HAD to optimize or you would'nt keep your character at higher levels and most martial classes were terrible classes to play if you did'nt multiclass (espetially the fighter much to my eternal dismay). One of the main designer of the system himself said ''Players are rewarded for achieving mastery of the rules and making good choices rather than poor ones.'' something he later regrets designing this way but the damage is done.

I really like coming up with a character concept or build, and then min maxing that. Basically like a themed challenge run of a game. For example, I wanted my Warlock to be very good at problem solving and utility casting, with an emphasis on illusions and cantrips. So while I picked Archfey and have taken none of the Eldritch blast evocations, I found out how to make a continuous, 15 square foot illusion with sound at level 2, by combining the sound of minor illusion (it’s a cantrip that is infinite and can be up-kept every turn) and misty visions, which can be cast for free instantly, and is the silent image spell. That means with just your action, you can have a moving, 15ft illusion with sound. Very useful, very fun.

I rolled amazingly for this character, who I named Galea. The point of the character was that she was a healer in a magic-light world, who now found herself in a magic-heavy world. She was a necromancer, but in a magic-light world, that consisted of casting *healing* spells into corpses, animating them with a portion of the caster's life energy. She discovered this by accident, and the army she was a part of assigned her to continue to do so. Here's the crux of the character: she is using those she failed to save to save those destined to die. The idea of the character was that the DM and I wanted the character to eventually lead the story (Curse of Strahd) into a different direction. She was to accept possession from the progenitor of the Elemental Chaos, Meyneth. It took the form of a Phoenix, and OH BOY does this character represent a LOT of philosophical concepts. Here's the cliffnotes. Every plane has a seemingly unimportant location, where it was first spoken, roared, or woven into existence. I labeled this concept the Spark of the World or Monad. Meyneth is the Spark of the Elemental Chaos, given form, and name, and voice. Nothing arises from nothing. Thus, everything that exists must have a sufficient reason to be. For every authority that exists, an antithesis will arise to challenge it. That antithesis must be more powerful or the status quo is unchanged. In many worlds, this can spiral into a state of hyperbole, and a simple existence becomes impossible. The goal of Meyneth's character is to located four Strands of Midnight''s tattered Weave, representing Time, Memory, Magic, and Physical Form. These, when combined at the Spark of a World, could cast the 11th level spell, Unmake Plane. All memory of the plane's existence would be forgotten, and the plane would cease to exist. HOWEVER, due to Meyneth's nature as a phoenix, Meyneth itself becomes one of the components. Meyneth and the Vessel die as part of the spell's effect, being in the plane, and Meyneth's revival causes the spell to become "Remake Plane" instead. All creatures on the plane have their memory erased, their bodies reverted to their natural state, magic is erased, and the plane is reverted to its beginning. The Vessel, who knew the consequences for setting hyperbole into motion, is the only one with their memories and power intact. ALL OF THIS TO SAY that after I rolled crazy stats for Galea, I asked the DM if I could subtract 2 from them all and gain them back when Meyneth possessed her.

Good for you. I random roll everything I can during character creation. Some things I probably shouldn't. But I harbor no ill will towards min-maxers. Glad you're willing to be open to other points of view.

The thing about AD&D was the randomized characteristic rolls. EVEN IF you were allowed to move stats around, not having "point buy" would result in at least one bad stat. Combined with AD&D's lethality, you basically ended up always having to "think outside the box" during play in order to survive. Part of the fun was trying to figure out what to make a suboptimal "rolled PC" so they had a chance of survival.

One of my favorite things over the past almost 9 years is watching all these new gamers to the hobby go through the same growing pains that previous generations have. You weren't right, or wrong Ginny, those were all points of view. The best thing about roleplaying is that there is no wrong way to do it and the right way is how your table decides is best for them.

Ginny Di: this video you posted shows abundant personal growth both emotionally and cognitively, that you have been through. I absolutely love your videos, and use many of them as source material for newer players at my table. I do have to add caveats that give the information your presenting relevance to my table but that's inherent in D&D as you've stated. Know that you will always have a seat at my table be it virtual or not.

I've learned so much as a DM from Ginny Di. I've gotten to the point now where I am embarrassed by my behavior as a new DM years ago. But my players were always so supportive, which is a big plus. I have so much respect for Ginny's self-accountability. It's a very difficult thing for DMs to do. Even more so for a RU-vidr. Keep being awesome.

Lol as a veteran who really hasn't played in the last few editions, it odd and interesting to see someone learning the lessons I learned decades ago. I need to find a good group to remind myself of the things I have forgotten. Role-playing is more than a game, it is literally a way to develop empathy for your fellow man as well as: deal with stress, hang with friends, escape the everyday grind, EXPRESS YOURSELF, help others express themselves, be heroic, explore your weaknesses. And overall just help develop yourself as part of the human race. So, I hope you love for it grows even as you realize there is no right way to do it. There as as many right ways, as there are role players.

I... gotta say. Roleplay and optimization are not mutually exclusive However, each route does block off some choices from the other. For a... well, very obvious way of putting it, look at warlock You can choose to take Eldritch Blast, or not. Taking it is obviously the most optimal choice, because it will consistently be the best thing to do on your turn when you're not casting spells with slots However, taking it does mean that you'll be using it on nearly every turn, which makes it harder to roleplay in combat doing cool things if you know that no matter what, it'd be more effective to stand at the back of the party and just zap. If you don't take it, now you're doing consistently less damage, which means you're not optimized. Eldritch blast is just the most glaring of these situations, every choice blocks something off... that's okay. You have two talent trees to go down, and a limited number of points. Its up to you to decide how optimal you want your character to be. And if anyone ever says you're doing it wrong, then they're the ones playing the game wrong. The only way to play DND wrong is to say that someone else is.

Thank you! @ 2:08 never fully understood why I don't fit into a lot of the newer stuff. I'm one of those "old school players" who started with AD&D and fell in love with it and have been struggling to try and get into the newer stuff and could never understand why I didn't seem to fit, both as a player and as a DM.

Ok this is the second video of yours I've seen, that interpretive dance ad absolutely earned my sub. Never before have I been able to say that the ad read was my favourite part of the video.

An "old grognard" here who rarely posts comments - One of my favorite recent characters was both min/maxed and totally u-noptomized. I had a socially awkward, effeminate, elf wizard, all of the stats were set for a very effective character. However, this particular wizard did not like the idea of killing the natural creatures of the world. We ran through Lost Mines of Phandelver, I had one, yup, one, spell that was combat oriented. I still ended up being very effective in combat situations and had some amazing role-play. I appreciate you hearkening back to your old video and pointing out that you have grown in your understanding of the hobby. Over 30 years of gaming, and I find myself watching you, and so many new players join the fun, keep growing, keep learning, and keep rolling those nat 20s!

For me even with an optimized character, a lot of room exists to RP off of the dice rolls and rolling for things they are not good at. As a DM I recently had two players trying to figure out more about their shared tragedies in their backstory. One rolled quite well and made progress, RPing that they felt better about their direction. The other, making the same rolls in single digits, they RP’ed not feeling that connected to the subject and finished the night passing out in a tavern.

I have to say that I really love your sponsorship ads so much.

I've always seen optimization as good, because its just pursuing the best path towards your character design goal. An optimized support wizard will look very different from an optimized CC/debuff wizard and have key differences in mechanics, character design choices, and play decisions. An optimized nautical swashbuckler will be fairly different from an optimized sailing samurai. So what I really think people have problems with is minmaxing or game breaking. Especially if you're using a niche mechanic/interaction or have a build that is atypical. Which is rather ironically what I'd call being out of the box. IMO, both sides are basically saying you're having fun incorrectly. Minmaxers reject what doesn't match their limited definition of optimal, Anti Minmaxers reject what doesn't match their limited definition of creative. Which is silly because ultimately both are engaging in different forms of optimization, just towards different goals or for different purposes. In the end, your character design choices are made to further a goal or serve a purpose. This could be something like damage, pulling off a particular combo, social encounters, sailing, healing, summoning, a particular play style, a theme, a storyline, a trope or character concept. So out of all the various possible choices, you have made the choice that made the most sense to you. Whether you are engaging in minmaxing, roleplay, or whatever else, you have just engaged in optimization! You thought about which choice would best serve the character you are building! tldr; the optimization argument is silly because optimized=/=minmaxed.

The world needs more of this kind of self reflection and personal growth.

When I first started playing I jumped straight into the books and tried my hand at optimization from the first character on. I was joining a table of peoples that had been playing for years and thought I had to start out swinging to keep up. Turns out I over estimated my table a bit and started challenging the dm to keep up with me. Since then I have gotten a large group of friends into the game and knowing it was going to be rough from a build standpoint I started doing something to compensate for my builds. I began to kneecap myself. For about three years now my builds look about 80% optimized, with glaring weaknesses, be it mechanically or rp. It's helped my friends take moments in campaigns and feel less like sidekicks and more like companions. Now even when I get to (more) "hardcore" tables I still bring my kneecaps. Guess I got a fetish for it now.

That makeup looks is fantastic! You rock it so well ❤ Video was also good 😊

Your bubbly preschool teacher energy is greatly appreciated. Keep making honest and earnest stuff!