If I make a barbarian character who wants to be a magician and uses only magic but is bad at it, am I just being a dick to my party? Is it a tried out trope? Thinking it could make for some good storytelling>rebellious daughter of a chief died, strained relationship filled with regret; he wants to honor her by learning magic to fulfill some final task of hers>brainwashed monosylabic ape thinks he's a grand wizard, his conception of what the job entails is strained by his complete lack of actual understanding or knowledge>mountain tribe faced with extinction send out representative to learn magic as their final hope> unprepared deadbeat dad barbarian runs away in pursuit of unattainable goal of being a mage, with a very guilty subconscious
>>96928724>am I just being a dick to my party?Depends on the system, but very likely to end up being one.Plus making deliberately incompetent character is generally a dick move, even with mechanical side of things ignored.>Is it a tried out trope? Very, but not that it matters.>Thinking it could make for some good storytellingThis would be bad even in a system geared toward this kind of stuff, like The Shadow of Yesterday, where the whole point is having a handicap to deal with.>greentextAre you 14?
That wouldn't even be funny at the beginning, much less when you're months into the campaign.
>>96928724You are only a dick when you play it as a slapstick parody. And they play ot seriously.Besides why should he be a complete incompetent wizard? He probably is good with shaman things, magic weapons and blood/healing magic. He thinks he casts a lightning spell, but he charged a rock with energy and throws it like a grenade. Flashbang.He knows how to threat a fleshwound, because Barbarians, but when you get sick or infected he kills a chicken and drowns you in blood while chanting prayers to a Barbarian war luck god.
wierd formatting with reddit spacing. probably ai but whatever. it depends on if the system supports it. what system are you playing?
>>96928724Its a joke character. The general advice is 'don't make joke characters outside of a one shot'. Inevitably the humor of the joke wears out, and now you just have a stupid character that you have to play for some unknown number of additional sessions. Even outside of suffering from your own decisions, you now have a table full of people that have to deal with your dumbass.
>>96928724Barbarian warriors can use magic. It's a false dichotomy presented by Conan, probably at the behest of jewish elites who fear the potential of Hyperbvrea.
>>96928724If you play D&D or a derivative of it, playing a dumb wizard isn't interesting. You do the same things as "normal" mage, you just fail at them more often.IIRC some Shadowrun editions let you play magic-low mages, they can still do things, but they pay more HP for them.
>>96928724Yes, making a useless le funni xD character while everyone else is trying to play a normal game, no matter how you're trying to paint it, is in fact being a dick to them.No doubt the next step in your character development masterpiece involves the super original and never before seen playing a normal barbarian doing normal barbarian stuff while yelling "I CAST FIST", so just save everyone else the time and play a normal character, or find a table of equally retarded redditors where you can be yourself.
>>96928724Whether or not you're "being a dick to your party" depends on what it means to be a barbarian in the game you're playing, what it means to use magic in the game you're playing, what it means to be bad at magic in the game you're playing, the difficulty of the game you're playing, what the other players are using for their characters and how their abilities synergize with such a character in the game you're playing.I wouldn't know if it's a tired out trope, as I've never seen it before. I've heard plenty about barbarians who can't read or outright can't use magic, but I've never heard of barbarians who can use magic but are bad at it.Any "good storytelling" will emerge from playing the game, so just play the game.
>>96928724Nothing wrong with playing a magician character who comes from some ”barbaric” origins. Being bad at it is the harder part. Maybe if you aren’t actually mechanically bad at what you do, but instead make a point of how much preparation and studying your character has gone through to get to this point, it could work.I mean a barbarian who could barely read but due to some of the reasons you described had to pick up the pen and learn to read and write and had to learn magic the hard way, and now despises ”talented” young upstarts and natural born sorcerors and warlocks and what not who took the shortcut to power. And maybe he’d sometimes when things get rough and he feels his skill in magic isn’t enough, revert back to his old self and use brute force instead (this as a flaw). Whatever you do, unless it is a humorous oneshot game, never make a ”joke” character. I’d hate to play with you if you did.
>>96928724Unless its supposed to be a minmax, try to be as efficient as possible and play to win sort of game, then no.
>>96928724What is your motivation for making such a character? What do they add to the game?If you're just doing it because you think it'll be funny, you're fucking up.
>>96928980To be a powerful wizard in Conan world you need to eat babies and summon demons so they can fuck you in the ass. You need to be an absolutely balls to the wall evil motherfucker with no lines left to cross and no puppy left unkicked.
>>96928724Forget the other people at the table for a second, are you going to enjoy playing a character who is terrible at what they're main gimmick is for even a single session?
>>96928724This is the little brother question in terms of tabletop play. What the foundational question here really is, happens to be:>Is it okay if I make a useless character on purposeAnd the answer is probably no. If your party is okay with it, that's understandable, but a majority of the time it's just going to be disrespecting people's time constraints for the sake of doing a bit over and over again. We allow the little brothers in the room to do this because they don't understand gameplay yet, and are still testing the waters, but if I showed up to any other game of any other format and someone was losing on purpose I would rather they just leave the table.So, preface with your other players at the table and see if it's okay with them that you're going to play a character who is mostly narrative-based, and isn't to be expected to contribute much to combat. If it were my group you'd probably be asked to play something else, or at least play with a more acceptable standard of inefficient.Nobody has to play optimal super characters, but ideally nobody should be playing anything so limp wristed there's no reason to invite them to the adventuring group.
>>96928724I've seen something similar before.
>>96928779Committing might actually bring a few laughs later into the campaign. If you keep consistent.>>96928724Just find a way to not be completely useless. Cantrips will work just fine, focus on tanking.
>>96928724Other anons already told you this is fucktarded, but I guess one thing needs to be stressed further:How the fuck you plan to sustain this "joke" past a single session?What about past three session?Is it still in any way funny five sessions in?
>>96933291Disagree. I feel you can make it plenty decent, especially if you allow a three level dip into a caster class.
>>96931228>And that's it, the joke ends here>But how about I stretch it for the whole session?>Or a campaign?
>>96933311>You can make it fun if you stop failing on purpose and start contributing.... so nothing like what OP asked for?
>>96928724Honestly, this is somehow still better than character concepts on Reddit. At least he has a reason to adventure.
>>96928724>but is bad at it>>96933322You can have three levels and be bad at something. You need at least a dash of caster, otherwise you're pulling teeth. I think taking a subclass in a caster but stopping there fits perfectly with what they're going for. Just don't do too good a job, but cantrips go up with character level just fine while still being absolute dog shit at "magic" in general.
>>96933347>Literal reddit character is better than reddit characters>>96933348Epic reading comprehension.I suggest re-reading entire OP, rather than fishing words that caught your attention.I will give you a tip: it's not about being low-powered to the point of being ineffective.
>>96933369Right on queue... An actual Reddit character.https://www.reddit.com/r/DnD/comments/1or9gcn/question_can_i_make_a_character_thats_literally/
>>96931204Yag-Kosha is benign to beneficient even though he does exact revenge upon Yara.
>>96928724people have said depends upon the system but no one has asked what system yet have they. But it really needs to be asked, what system are you going to be playing that has the mechanisms for wizard bad at magic?D&D has a chance for spell failure for a low Wis cleric but nothing equivalent for a magic user. You planning on deliberately learning only low utility spells like dancing lights, erase, mending, nystul's magic aura?You can try wild magic but that is not fun for very long at all and like others have said, it sounds really like you're making a joke character.>Is it a tried out trope?Loser character always fails is a tried out trope. Not a fun character to play, usually worse to play with in a party.Character is bad at his main role but somehow achieves stuff despite obvious failure has been a tried out trope across many media, not least of which is pic related
>>96928724Ah the "Iron" and "Fist" caster. Aka the Rock Lee.
>>96928980Nah, it more along the idea you need to spend all your time mastering it just for basic effects, and many are willing to take shortcuts to speed it up but they come at great cost over the try and true.
>>96928724Like there's something to be said for playing sub-optimally aka not playing at the most twinked out level but still at least helping the party out in a time of crisis. But if you're knowingly playing a dude whose gimmick is that he sucks during a life and danger struggle, and you don't plan for him to improve at all whether that be getting good at his craft or switching his skill/mindset once it becomes clear he's not going to be the magician he hopes to be, then yes. Without question, that's dickish behavior.
