Why you should build your D&D character "wrong" 

This video was sponsored by Skillshare! The first 1000 people to use the link will get a free trial of Skillshare Premium Membership: skl.sh/ginnydi12201

The only wrong character is one who takes the fun out of the game for everyone else. play whatever you like, just dont be a arse.

Make a rogue and pour all possible points in intimidation "YOU DONT SEE ME" "OKAY OKAY!"

Me: *Looks at my poorly planned characters* Me: Y-yes this was my plan all along!

I once played a character who’s fear of messing up would cause her to close her eyes every time she tried to fire a bow and thus had to roll with disadvantage. It was a lot of fun, especially the time she really needed to make the shot to save the day and managed to do it even with her eyes closed. After that word got out about an “amazing archer who could make trick shots under pressure even with her eyes closed.” Needless to say that confidence boost meant she could keep her eyes open when firing, or at least take a peek.

My friend made a Eldritch Knight Gnome that his purpose is to learn the enlarge spell to became a medium size!

Hey thats illegal you cant be roleplaying in my roleplaying game. Yeah I see the problem here.

I had an unoptomized character once! He was a Kobold barbarian. He died session 1. I'd love to play him again.

The first dnd character I ever created was a half-orc druid named Gug. She didn't speak Orcish or understand orc culture because she was adopted as an infant and raised by wood elves, and despite being huge and muscled she was an absolute flower child who just wanted to vibe in the forest lmao. So much fun, I adore her.

There are so many people who think D&D is “too smart for them” and I can’t help but think it’s partly due to these “optimized only” people

"If Eldritch Blast was necessary for a Warlock, it wouldn't be an option. It would just be a class feature." *holds up crown* You dropped this, queen.

I have a wizard necromancer who I roleplay as a healer, using his power to stave off Death from his allies and bring it to his foes. The whole character is based around the balance of life and death and the "cost" of magical healing. I have things like vampiric touch, grim harvest, and life transference. When I commit to a heal it costs me HP, which as a wizard is pretty valuable!

I optimize within concept, and I help other players do so. I put the story first, then try to make it work mechanically. I find it a lot more fun than playing the best build for the class.

One of my friends made a character whose self-declared occupation was "party wizard" but could only cast magic missile. Turns out he was actually a monk and his magic missile was actually a staff of returning. I think that qualifies as the right way to build a character wrong.

Matt Mercer: It’s ridiculous to call someone’s fun wrong. Enthusiastic Torturer: Too true! *wipes a tear*

I could hear the Ferengi influence oozing from Ginny's utterance of "feeeee-males!" and I'm 100% here for it!

I play a Half-Orc Paladin that didn't realize for the first few levels that he was a Paladin. It is still my favourite character ever. Every time we get in a fight, I love playing him as a brute fighter, going for things he isn't specialized in like grappling, throwing random stuff, headbutting people and going for unarmed combat. This certainly doesn't put out the raw amount of damage that I could be doing, it makes for far more interesting combat and roleplay. I am a DM, and urge my players to play what they think is cool, and to stop focussing on numbers and optimisation.

In the words of Sam Riegel: "What is the worst character ? I want to be the worst character...." ;)

"You forgot to pick offensive spells." "Nope. Didn't forget. Don't want 'em."

4:32 "For example, combining a race with no intelligence bonus with an intelligence-based class." You guessed one of my favorite characters from years past! I played a half-orc wizard in a campaign, and the biases it exposed lead him to disdain physical solutions when a magical one was available. It was so fun to have him run out of spell slots in a big fight (3rd ed D&D, btw) and have to resort to his staff as a weapon . . . then get a critical hit and utterly demolish his opponent, to his own annoyance. :)

That "shouldn't be playing D&D" comment makes absolutely no sense, when they moved to 5e they put so much emphasis on it being a story telling game as well as a combat game, if you want a more rules focused game, go play pathfinder.

I'm currently playing a Kenku trickster cleric with an Int of 5. He's so breathtakingly stupid that he does not realise he is a cleric. I've never had so much fun.

"I'm not saying you should make a character who's bad at everything" My Dice Roles: Too late

Damn straight! This is how the game used to be played when there were three books and a dozen modules to pull all of your fantasy from. This is how it used to be. There weren’t 200 books and 50 years of experiences. It was real and raw the way it should be! Don’t let anyone play your game for you. If you want a broken player that’s a blast to play then by all means do it. If people complain, chalk it up to inexperience and stupidity.

This video inspired me to create a tiefling wizard named Lestat Stormebrooke. complex backstory aside he has NO damage spells (aside from hellish rebuke) but instead, entirely illusion spells that prevent enemies from hitting him. He is a wizard who is a tank who has low hp, a little known combo. He gets up in the enemies face and with his fleet of mirror images and illusions keeps the enemies eyes on him, or rather hims.

Ginny: build your characters wrong! Me, who played a wizard that used a set of cards against humanity instead of standard spells: you don’t need to tell me twice!

I have always hated the "you're doing it wrong" refrains on mechanical decisions in D&D. Let me enjoy my character.

I've heard stories about player characters that are a talking slice of bread, a demon posessing an eel who swimms in a fish bowl that is carried by a robot spider that is controlled by the demon/eel via a psycic link, or a sentient sword that takes over the body of a warrior that wields it... The rules say the DM is in charge, not the rules. If the DM allows it, it is correct even if the rule book states otherwise. Even if the rules said that a Warlock must have high CHA and Eldritch Blast, if your DM allows a Warlock with no Eldritch Blast and low CHA, you can play that. I am looking to DM a group myself as soon as I get something set up. And about what Characters are going to be played there, I place two restrictions: One: it has to be compatible with the setting. If there's elves and swords in the setting, an elf with a sword works, while a cyborg with laser hands may not. In a different setting, that would be the other way around. The second one is that I have to be able to work with the character, meaning I have to understand who the character is, what motivates them and how to set up NPCs and enemies and story parts that will actually affect the character. Wanting to please your god is a common one, but not so much a useful one if I know little or nothing about that god, nor how much you know about that god, in that case, we're going to have a long conversation, but if your mother got abducted and you're on a quest to find her, I can place your mother somewhere in the world and let you find clues on where she might be.

I love mixing races with not-so cliche classes they're combined with. I have a Fire Genasi Fighter-Samurai, a Half-Orc Monk, a Half-Elf Barbarian, a Changeling Artificer. It all makes sense how they got to those classes through their personality and/or backstory, and I love them all so much.

I hate that this video is necessary. Who cares what/how other people are playing at their tables? Let them have fun.

I made a Druid who absolutely, *completely* hates the outdoors. I love Evelyn.

I played a gnome who was forced to be a garden gnome as a slave in the past. And he was a wild magic mage who basically screwed up every spell he did. I think that's what made him fun to play. The fact that he was a nervous wreck and slowly learning to be more confident and that reflecting on how his spells got less terribly destructive over time with his confidence.

I think that, as with a lot of things, group composition is key. If you have outside-the-box people and optimizers in the same group it will cause tension, which I've seen first hand. There is no "wrong" way to play, just make sure everybody's on the same page.

"That sh*t is a gift!!" -Matthew Mercer (regarding really low stats)

I'm sure that Tasha's Cauldron of Everything is driving these people nuts.

Can't help but remember that there was a time in my current party where our Wizard had a greater strength score than our Barbarian, and essentially ignored magic in favour of shanking everyone with a dagger. Our Wizard has killed more people with her dagger than casted spells, and it's brilliantly entertaining!

You definitely should build them “wrong” so you can give them flaws and interesting ways to work around that

My frail little sorcerer who has a feat in tavern brawler to reflect her time as a barmaid in a rough waterside tavern approves of this message :D

I made a rogue. She's a human. That means the sneak of the party is the only member who can't see in the dark... I love her so much; her story is getting so good thanks to our DM being awesome. The twist? She's not edgy! She's a shy but friendly runaway from a noble house.

i love this advice!! i'm partially doing this for my first dnd character because it's a very casual campaign with a full table. they're a bard whose instrument is the washboard and whose weapon is the boomerang, but they're also a changeling and usually appear about 6 y/o. i chose the washboard and boomerang to help emphasize that they are less mature than their peers. i'm in love with them thematically, and it's led to some really funny moments for the whole table. can't agree with her advice enough!

My sorcerer has the actor feat, which is pretty useless, but it makes sense for her backstory and forces me to think creatively about who or what I could pretend to be to improve a situation. It has lead to some really cool moments from scaring someone into giving us intel by pretending to be a necromancer and even luring people over to me with fake voices.

Nothing like a Goliath barbarian who took levels in wizard just so he can be call the librabarian

Hi Ginny. We're a bunch of 50 year old's who've been playing RPGs for forty years and still do twice a week. You play the damn game anyway you want . You're doing it right when everyone around that table is having fun. It's lovely, hearing about you discover this great hobby and hear some new ideas from you that remind me what we need to be doing with our games. Thanks for doing what you're doing. Any time you find yourself in Blighty, you can come game with us any time :)

I've been playing D&D since the early 1980s, through almost all of its incarnations and I can tell you that some of the greatest fun we had as a group was when we made "broken' characters on purpose and cut loose. I once had a sorcerer with an Intelligence of 5. His backstory was that he was once an aspiring magic user that had a really bad encounter with an Intellect Devourer and got cracked in the head by the tail of a White Dragon that left him a shell of his former self. I played him like "Aunt Clara" from the old TV show Bewitched - always acting on top of his game but bumbling and screwing up things badly when needed. There was no pressure to outsmart anything. The roleplay was hella fun and hilarious. Good video!

I just want to say thank you! I ran across one of your videos today and the way you explain characters in d&d has helped me tremendously. I am really new to d&d and I’m already in 3 different campaigns so its a lot to keep up with. It feels amazing to see that other girls are just as passionate about playing d&d as I am. In my group I am the only girl who plays d&d so it felt like the other guys didn’t really accept me. They don’t let me talk much and I’m not the type of person to interrupt someone else while they are talking. I just had a session last night and the dm didn’t give me a big role because i didn’t have a big backstory. Its like they just expect me to know everything they know and none of them really taught me anything. They are also not into experimenting races with different classes and when i do something unusual they tell me that its not a good idea. Its hard being the only girl because they put you into a stereotype of “you don’t know anything and you should just quit.” i’ve already had an encounter like that where one of the dm’s told another player that if i don’t start talking during session then i should just quit. I really don’t want to quit and i’m doing my best to study and understand the game but I think they don’t understand that its just a game.

I tried to build a half-orc transmutation only wizard, but my table didn't like that. Took it out on character in game. So now my character has anger issues and fireball.

Me, who apparently builds all of my characters “wrong”: 👁👄👁

Is this woman made of sunshine? The way she carries her words just brighten my day, jeez.

In my experience, meta-gaming ruins the experience for me. Things become homogenous and cliche and one-dimensional. I don't even like multi-classing for non-story purposes because it's just another way to further min/maxing. I prefer to come up with an idea for a character, get the stats that fit that character (warts and all), trust my DM and table, and just see what happens. But I don't like reading the last page of a book first, either. The memories of stuff blowing up in my character's face are just as entertaining and enduring as taking down the big bad and "winning D&D"... sometimes more so. The characters aren't real, the stories are made up, and the DM is not my enemy. Let's just have the fun we want to have. So, abide by Weaton's Law, and repeat to yourself: "Their character is not my character, and that's okay."

I'm a minmaxer, I love finding the best way to do things, but the absolute best ways of building each class has already been solved a long time ago, so I find it much more fun to limit myself with a set of boundaries, and then find what the "best" character is within those boundaries. For example, Kobolds don't make the best barbarians, but I absolutely love the idea of an Ancestral Guardian Kobold who summons the ancient spirit of an ancestor (most likely his grandfather) as this gigantic ethereal dragon head made of pure draconic rage. I love the image of a small harmless looking Kobold approaching a group of people who laugh at his stature, only to be terrified when they see the dragon spirit hovering over him. Creating perfect characters is boring. It's the minutiae of characters that make them fun. If the character is already perfect, how can they improve?

Our "flawed" "wrong" character is the only one who hasn't died in our dungeon crawl...so maybe we're the wrong ones for even trying to optimize lol

I'm just getting into D&D, I've played a one shot and now I'm in my first ongoing game w/ my bf DM'ing and other friends. I am obsessed with your channel because I am STILL so nervous when it comes to playing and role playing. This video really made me so happy. I have so many ideas for my current and future characters and I've been afraid I wasn't making the right choices, but it just sounded fun. THANK YOU SO MUCH FOR THIS

My friend and I were invited to come and play with her boyfriend's D&D group which consisted of 3 grown adult men and then her boyfriend (he fits right in with them). Anyway there's already a bit of a barrier considering we're two nerdy, artsy teenage girls (jk I'm trans but nobody knows that soooo) and they're a bunch of grown adult men who have a very innappropirate sense of humor (this doesn't particularly bother me and my friend but if they start directing it towards us (ie making innapropriate jokes about us) it will be a problem). We've only gotten together twice so far. The first time we just kinda sat in on the original group finishing up their campaign and we played like pre-made characters. The second time was us planning the campaign and character building and stuff. So my friend (who's never played before) comes up with a fun idea. She wants to play an extremely sexy elf who is a powerful badass spell caster type of class. Well apparently the rest of the group while I was busy in the other room told her she couldn't be an elf because "they're stuck up and full of themselves". I didn't know this until later when we went back to her house. She told me "I brought up that I wanted to be an elf and they said I couldn't" and I was very confused and asked why and she said "because they said they were rich high-and-mighty people and were assholes". And I flew off the handle. THAT MAKES NO SENSE! "Sorry you can't be this character because we've already pre-determined what she will act like based on our stereotypes of elves and we don't want to deal with that character. AND if you DON'T follow that stereotype then you'll be acting "untrue" to the race" is what that sounded like to me. I went on a full on rant about how she can live out her sexy high-elf dreams if she wants to and they can go screw off. That line of reasoning literally makes no sense and completely discouraged her from making her elf character until my long and heated rant. It's that type of thinking that stifles people's creativity and robs everyone of a possibly awesome and fun character. It would be different if they were saying "hey if you want to be a sorcerer I would suggest being this race instead as it will make it easier for you since it's your first time playing" but they literally told her she COULDN'T be an elf because they think elves are bad people. Ok you tell that to Legolas you jerk. He wasn't a stuck up, selfish, classist jerk......or at least I don't think he was. It's been awhile since I've seen the movies or read the books lol. But anyway hearing that they said that to her (and after seeing the DM completely fail at understanding his obviously "has a hard time socializing and fitting in" son) I was re-inspired to make my own campaign. I'm hoping to make a space where me and my friends can play D&D and they KNOW that everyone will try their best to understand. I've never ran a D&D game before and the only one's I've been a part of were really badly DMed and the players were assholes (but that's a WHOOLLE thing for another day). So needless to say this will be a learning curve but I'm going to try my best! Sorry this is so long but long story short: DON'T TELL PEOPLE WHAT CHARACTERS THEY CAN OR CANNOT MAKE!!! It's all about having fun and creating a fun story and real people aren't perfectly curated so why do you expect D&D characters to be?

I made a druid who could only wild shape into bugs. She was fun

Just going to say, Warforged Druid cause Transformers are cool.

I always love your ideas about roleplaying according to stats and class, it actually makes it so much easier to roleplay that way.

I love creating “wrong” characters because as I told my one player, “Characters are interesting not because of what they can do, but rather what they can’t do.” It’s been kind of frustrating because my players are all people who like to min/max and I’m just over here like, “But what are their flaws!? What can they not do!? Why are there stakes for them!?”

One of the coolest """"suboptimal""" characters that I've seen in my party is our most recent addition, a Necromancy wizard. In his backstory, his whole family were artisans who used Animate Dead and similar spells to have zombies do things like farm, clean, etc. while they pursued their various crafts (the zombies are his ancestors and therefore were actually expecting to become zombies once they died, because that's just how his family traditions are, which is also really neat). He learned to be a wizard basically *only* for the purpose of enhancing his craftsmanship, and fell into the whole "adventurer" thing totally by accident. So his spellbook has (for a level 10 wizard) THREE spells which can actually be used to deal damage in combat: Toll the Dead, Magic Missile, and Enervation. That's IT. *Everything* else on his list is about flavor - he has stuff like Creation, Fabricate, Tenser's Floating Disk, Spider Climb, Telekinesis, and all sorts of spells that make perfect sense for a guy who builds boats for a living, but very little sense for a guy who fights people every day. As a result, in combat, he's usually running around and doing *really* creative stuff that I would just never think to do during a fight. He also usually has a few animated corpses around, and THEY fight to protect him and the other PCs, but a lot of the time he's doing stuff like casting Telekinesis to flip over an archmage's cauldron of Evil Liquid, preventing it from shooting out a Flameskull each turn, like it has been, and stuff like that. He was *extremely* creative both during character creation and then consistently so in every single fight his character has been a part of, and it honestly blows me away with how much of a bold, and *super* interesting choice it was and continues to be. Playing """suboptimal""" characters is, in my mind, the actual hardest/most interesting way to play, and I think everybody should do it.

I can see a protest now, be all, "You would dare make a character built for role play, in a role play game? You monster!"

i recently made a halfling barbarian character and was worried i’d get looked down on by pros for the poor combination - this video makes me feel a lot better about it, so thank you for making it!

I often actively make my spell list limited by arbitrary lines (my Druid/barbarian uses only earth based spells, my rogue/sorcerer only had spells that help with espionage, my peppermint based wizard uses mostly ice magic) and I find that incredibly fun. It means I often take spells that have more utility outside of combat which means I’m almost always able to help. Im also still often a powerhouse in combat. I also don’t tend to multi-class based on mechanics (see above rogue/sorcerer) those are my favorite games.

Damn, this kinda takes some pressure off my back. Maybe I need to find another group because I would love to roleplay more.

Non dexterous rouge with the Lucky feat makes for many, "better lucky than good" moments.

I absolutly love this tip! Recently I spent 3 days building a Half-Elf Ranger/Bard with spells and abilities based off of story instead of optimization. I was soooo excited to play her especially since playing her was going to be my first ever official session that wasn't a session 0. (It was session 95 for the group I was joining) I showed her off to a couple friends I knew were playing quite a bit. While one is more new and just mused how crazy she was built, another one told me that she wasn't optimized because I didn't focus on doing only one thing, and her skills and abilities were spread out not beneficial for the game. He compared her to a lower level rogue in his group that only focused on one thing and on average can put out more damage. That was until I gave a paragraph to show how she would use her abilities to put out just as much and a little more damage on average while protecting herself, then when things get rough and she is in a corner, she would have an escape or two to get away and heal. This would go a long with her story as for the time that the group she is joining up with she was traveling mostly on her own and having to fend for herself. So her spells and abilities would be more spread out and allow her to be a one man party. At the end of my first session, her insane out of battle abilities that the friend "chastised" me for, ended up keeping us from getting into a fight and rooms with at a noble estate, despite the party cutting a large chandelier damaging the property, and another person stealing their stuff back, plus some. She even relaxed the guards releasing the tension. So yeah, she is built "wrong" but she is an individual with a story, one that saw her out on her own most of her journey, and her build shows it. Also if you think outside the box and not tunnel vision in on doing just one thing, she can stand well with the rest of the party. True she won't put out much damage in a single turn, but she is hard to hit, and can whittle down the toughest of foes, IF they could find a reason, or in their heart to actually attack her. So yeah, build a character "wrong" and have fun with them :)

If you still want to make a character “optimally” Tashas gives players the ability to assign the statistical bonuses to any stat instead of the ones that are listed. Like +2 to strength for an Elf, or -1 to Constitution for a Bugbear.

Ginny Di: “You should play what you want” Me, a lover of Purple Dragon Knight: “this woman is very wise”

Sometimes we all (or maybe just me) need a person, who says: "So do it! Pick any cupcake! You are allowed!" in similar kind of situations)

Fireball is one of the best combat spells, but my character is storm themed, and therefore has a storm themed spell list. So she uses lightning bolt often to kind of replace fireball. It's alot of fun to restrict yourself and see how you can adapt!

I’m about to play me first session in two weeks. And this was real an inspiration to me. It really helped me. Thank you Ginny.

After playing 15 years and learning so much of Ginny's advice the hard way, I'm really happy new folk starting their journey with ttrpgs, be them D&D or not, have this kind of videos to help them navigate the really confusing, and even hostile, rpg culture.

Ginny: I write for D&D, and if you're watching this so do you! Me, crying: Please, I want to! I just need one of these "parties" I have heard so much about!

My first character lived in the Woods and was scared of technology, my friend played an artificer with a steel defender. Every time we held watch, I gave myself disadvantage, because she would be distracted by this metal construct.

Never stop being you Ginny 😊. This gave me some inspiration for a new D&D game I'm about to start. Thanks!

When it’s literally a fantasy game and people still tell you what to do.

One of my favorite characters EVER was a kobold barbarian "meh" stats and delusions of grandeur. He was so fun that I still think about bringing him back occasionally.

I recently started playing a Forest Gnome Barbarian and he has become my favorite toon to roleplay. There had been times of hilarity and also sheer idiocrity, but thats what makes it fun. Much love to everyone out there and I hope everyone is having a wonderful day ight!

I'm happy I'm not the only one with this mind set. I almost always play my characters "wrong" because in my opinion it just gives things more character. It makes characters feel more real to me when they aren't "perfect."

DO NOT EAT THE CUPCAKE! Otherwise, you might find yourself being besties with a blue Tiefling with a gap in your memory...

To paraphrase a sign I once saw: D&D and sex have at least one thing in common; as long as you're having fun, you're doing it right.

I don’t understand why people hate having characters with flaws or that have uniqueness to them. It makes the collaborative story feel more incredibly unique and fun!

Woof this one hits deep. One of my favorite characters I made was a warlock with a focus on necrosis. Meaning my main damage cantrip was Chill Touch. Not Eldritch Blast. I showed up to my table and the showed my DM my sheet and he said "No Eldritch Blast? But... that's what warlocks do!" Have fun your own way kids.

"Edgy flower princess" is a descriptor I never thought I'd hear. Nice.

I just built a deep gnome barbarian who uses boomerangs. COME AT ME, INTERNET.

You give great advice for players of any version. I have been playing for 4 decades and its great to watch your episodes. Thank you.

In new here. But all of those are absolutely good points to make. As a Dm to 3 games at current i consistently tell my players, especially new ones, to imagine who they want to be and then turn that into a dnd character. We have a Loki themed Druid with levels of Rouge. A Thor themed ancestral gardian barbarian. A Poison ivy themed Cleric of nature, a Big Hat Logan themed Wizard and my favorite, an IZombie themed Warlock. On that same note, a centaur fascinated by her own nature as part beast is one of my favorite characters. She was a Centaur Beastmaster Ranger with 3 levels of rouge for expertise in animal handling and some slight buffs to her bow. It made sense for the fact she loved animals and archery. But none of it was well optimised and yes Beastmaster is a bit boring to say the least. But leagues of fun to play. What a great gal that Zorla was.

It depresses me that people actually messaged you just to say you're playing a game wrong. It's a game, if you're having fun then you're doing it right.

Next upcoming character: Poindexter, a wizard with an average intelligence who became a wizard because his mother told him to, but he has anger issues and gets frustrated when he runs out of spells and just starts punching the enemy; becomes a multi-classed barbarian

I love designing optimized character but I don’t really enjoy actually playing them

This is why I once made a character by doing the 140+ questionnaire "Which DnD character are you?" and came out with: Chaotic Neutral - Human Fighter (STR 11 - DEX 12 - CON 14 - INT 16 - WIS 16 - CHA 12) I then for good measure added the background "Sage - Researcher" and gave him proficiency in Arcana to "Well, actually" any actual spell casters. Lastly, I gave him the Protection fighting style and gave him a shield and hand crossbow. Playing this character was wild and quixotic as all hell, and great fun.

"Take any cupcake. You're allowed." Me: *takes entire tray*

"Hello friends... and FOES!" You've already earned that like. 🤣

Hi Ginny! Just recently started following you, although admittedly, I’ve seen a couple of your videos years ago. I love this! I know people who tries maxing every character they make. I’ve said for years, when you make up a character you are going to play this for, hopefully, a long time. Play someone you like, with the background you want. Story and background all add to role playing and will have a bigger payoff than how much damage someone can do who is a boring person. Kudos to you for this video!!

THANK YOU! I have a Master's in English with a focus on Narratology, and just left a campaign because the DM was running a straight up Combat game with no room for narrative or role play. I was a Lore Bard, which he didn't like or understand because he saw its only use as a healer, and I did not want to be the healer. He asked me to change characters multiple times, when I proposed a Druid, he rolled his eyes, and said that wouldn't help the party defeat enemies I decided to leave the group, and took my Moon Elf Bard to another campaign that is story driven and a lot more fun. And I multiclassed my Lore Bard with a Star Druid because it fit her backstory and goals. I love her and she fits perfectly with the new campaign. My old DM would definitely say I'm playing DnD wrong.

My take is building a character "Wrong" is just playing D&D on hard mode.

My wife and I played a gnome barbarian and a goliath wizard. We had been switched at birth by a blind old midwife, and we genuinely thought we were a short goliath barbarian and a tall gnome wizard.

Ok so I just found this channel/ video series last night, but this was definitely the best intro so far lol

Weirdly, I've been looking at character optimisation, but I also love the idea of going against the usual expectations: I've been planning out a halfling barbarian/fighter with the 'Noble' background, who became a barbarian because he'd had anger issues throughout his comfortable life, and only discovered he thrived in times of strife when he got lost in the woods... Since then, he's been working to channel his violent impulses into good deeds, but also to control his temper better, so from level 2 onwards he'd be taking levels in fighter instead of barbarian. Because I happen to enjoy the whole "character optimisation" thing personally (no disrespect to those who don't, it's just interesting to me), I've decided to have him focus on Dexterity and Constitution, so his unarmoured defence will be high enough for him to have great AC whilst Erroll Flynn-ing his way through combat in his noble's finery and a fancy-looking buckler-and-rapier, and Raging will mostly be just for damage resistance rather than Strength-based combat...

Why *wouldn't* someone want to play a Tiefling Paladin? They join the order in their rebellious teens to get away from one or two bad parents, and... lesse... resistant to fire, free thaumaturgy cantrip... (free megaphone and mood lighting!) and a rebuke. And charisma's the casting stat for a paladin. Plus, you get out of a lot of family reunions! Win-win, really. :D (dammit, now you've given me a whole new character I want to play.)

I knew I'd like this from the title, and loved it from the first 10 seconds. I want to give this more likes.

This may come as a shock to some people, but like non-optimized characters can actually be more realistic. Like having these gaping knowledge/personality gaps (i.e. not knowing really popular spells, being a druid who actually doesn't like animals/nature, etc) is really realistic. And it can make for a great story. "Quick! Sorcerer, use fireball!!!" "Ok so guys, there's been something I've been meaning to tell you about that..." Or "Hey, can you go see if the forest creatures know anything?" "Sure. *walks over to animals* just be cool guys. I know you can't understand me but just pretend like we're having a good conversation...." "Did you find anything out." "Uhhh no...they didn't see anything. Yeah..."