What are your weirdest character ideas for Baldur's Gate 3 or D&D in general?

[Lord Adorable]

Mine is a Dragonborn Druid who is convinced she is actually a Bugbear because she can wild shape into a bear.

[Dragon Master]

Halfling bard who uses ventriloquisim for his performance checks and casts spells through a puppet.

It's an actual bard I created for D&D once.

[Lord Adorable]

Originally posted by Dragon Master:

Halfling bard who uses ventriloquisim for his performance checks and casts spells through a puppet.

It's an actual bard I created for D&D once.

Casting spells through a puppet? I,ll admit, that is creative. After all, Bards are all about expressing art in some form and their magic stems from the heart & soul they put into their performances, so why not puppetry?

[Yojo0o]

FINE, I guess I'll stay on topic.

My newest character in a home game where I finally get to be a player is a Custom Lineage (cranium rats in a trench coat) Swarmkeeper Ranger. I'm using a combination of Thorn Whip and the Swarmkeeper displacement feature on attacks to bounce victims back and forth across my Spike Growth field for massive shred damage and environmental kills. I can fly/hover, I can cast Dissonant Whispers as a reaction when enemies enter my melee range, and I'm a wisdom-scaling brawler with 2.5 attacks per round thanks to Polearm Master. It's one of the most fun and powerful characters I've ever played.

[Lord Adorable]

Originally posted by Yojo0o:

FINE, I guess I'll stay on topic.

My newest character in a home game where I finally get to be a player is a Custom Lineage (cranium rats in a trench coat) Swarmkeeper Ranger. I'm using a combination of Thorn Whip and the Swarmkeeper displacement feature on attacks to bounce victims back and forth across my Spike Growth field for massive shred damage and environmental kills. I can fly/hover, I can cast Dissonant Whispers as a reaction when enemies enter my melee range, and I'm a wisdom-scaling brawler with 2.5 attacks per round thanks to Polearm Master. It's one of the most fun and powerful characters I've ever played.

Dragging people over your Spike Growth and then pushing them back over it sounds like something out of Mortal Kombat. Gotta be bad for one's skin.

Dissonant Whispers before beating someone up just sounds cruel. Writhing Tide sounds like a fun bonus.
Yes. I think you're right. It does sound very fun.

[Ghost]

Originally posted by Lord Adorable:

Originally posted by Dragon Master:

Halfling bard who uses ventriloquisim for his performance checks and casts spells through a puppet.

It's an actual bard I created for D&D once.

Casting spells through a puppet? I,ll admit, that is creative. After all, Bards are all about expressing art in some form and their magic stems from the heart & soul they put into their performances, so why not puppetry?

Puts me in mind of an old story about someone who did something similar, but kept acting as though the puppet was a god - convincing everyone they met that it was real, which escalated until it actually became one.

[Yojo0o]

Originally posted by Ghost:

Originally posted by Lord Adorable:

Casting spells through a puppet? I,ll admit, that is creative. After all, Bards are all about expressing art in some form and their magic stems from the heart & soul they put into their performances, so why not puppetry?

Puts me in mind of an old story about someone who did something similar, but kept acting as though the puppet was a god - convincing everyone they met that it was real, which escalated until it actually became one.

Banjo, from Order of the Stick?

[Ghost]

Originally posted by Yojo0o:

Originally posted by Ghost:

Puts me in mind of an old story about someone who did something similar, but kept acting as though the puppet was a god - convincing everyone they met that it was real, which escalated until it actually became one.

Banjo, from Order of the Stick?

Pretty much, but was an actual campaign, not a comic.

[Lord Adorable]

Originally posted by Ghost:

Originally posted by Lord Adorable:

Casting spells through a puppet? I,ll admit, that is creative. After all, Bards are all about expressing art in some form and their magic stems from the heart & soul they put into their performances, so why not puppetry?

Puts me in mind of an old story about someone who did something similar, but kept acting as though the puppet was a god - convincing everyone they met that it was real, which escalated until it actually became one.

Honestly, this kind of terrifies me. I've been exposed to a concept like this before with how the Warhammer 40k Orks work, but they tend to do it on a more comical level.

Having a puppet that actually grows into becoming an evil god sounds like something out of Dominions 5 lore where several Pretender Gods are spirits inhabiting statues, monoliths or even fountains of endless blood.

It also brings to mind the concept of Tsukumogami, tools that have become so old that they've grown a soul and sapience.

In other words, I like this idea a lot.

[ExcaliburV]

Just wanna say I like this topic, but man am I not creative enough to have anything to contribute.

[Meowella]

I played a Goblin Barbarian/Monk with crazy crazy jump skill, especially when raging. Literally I created a gummi bear!!!

[Yojo0o]

Originally posted by ExcaliburV:

Just wanna say I like this topic, but man am I not creative enough to have anything to contribute.

You gotta start somewhere! One day you're playing a sword+shield champion fighter... and then before you know it, you'll be piloting a swarm of cranium rats in a trench coat in no time!

Jokes aside, to steal a topic I first read about in a blog about how MTG cards are designed, you can build a character top-down or bottom-up. Top-down design is when you start with an interesting character idea, then figure out a way to make the mechanics of DnD 5e or whatever other system fit your character. Bottom-up is the opposite: You start with the mechanics you want to play with, and then write a character to fit those mechanics. My example character above was bottom-up design, in that I really wanted to abuse Spike Growth as much as possible, and wound up with a janky character with as much displacement and supplemental magic as I could find, and a thematic connection between race/species and class/subclass. So, if you're struggling to come up with intricate DnD character ideas, think about whether you're approaching from top-down or bottom-up... then flip it! Could result in some fantastic new ideas.

And, of course, if you already knew that, I hope my rambling doesn't come across as condescending. I just like making new characters.

[Dragon Master]

Originally posted by Ghost:

Originally posted by Lord Adorable:

Casting spells through a puppet? I,ll admit, that is creative. After all, Bards are all about expressing art in some form and their magic stems from the heart & soul they put into their performances, so why not puppetry?

Puts me in mind of an old story about someone who did something similar, but kept acting as though the puppet was a god - convincing everyone they met that it was real, which escalated until it actually became one.

It did put me in some rather hilarious situations since I role-played him as incredibly shy and he used puppetry to cope with anti-social behavior, where the puppet was very outgoing and friendly and, due to magic being a thing and there being golems in the world it wasn't a stretch for the average citizen (and eventual monarchs) to think the puppet was its own individual character rather than a controlled puppet handled by a ventriloquist bard.

There was a hilarious moment where the puppet was set to be executed by beheading for offending the king because my bard was forcibly separated (by death and was recovering in a temple) and the king summoned the puppet to report on what happened, but without the ventriloquist it was just a puppet so the king though the puppet was snubbing and insulting him.

[Lord Adorable]

Originally posted by Dragon Master:

Originally posted by Ghost:

Puts me in mind of an old story about someone who did something similar, but kept acting as though the puppet was a god - convincing everyone they met that it was real, which escalated until it actually became one.

It did put me in some rather hilarious situations since I role-played him as incredibly shy and he used puppetry to cope with anti-social behavior, where the puppet was very outgoing and friendly and, due to magic being a thing and there being golems in the world it wasn't a stretch for the average citizen (and eventual monarchs) to think the puppet was its own individual character rather than a controlled puppet handled by a ventriloquist bard.

There was a hilarious moment where the puppet was set to be executed by beheading for offending the king because my bard was forcibly separated (by death and was recovering in a temple) and the king summoned the puppet to report on what happened, but without the ventriloquist it was just a puppet so the king though the puppet was snubbing and insulting him.

This entire thing sounds like it could make for one heck of a movie, I won't lie.

And I'd absolutely watch it just for the pure insanity.

[Nihrahk]

Dragonborn barbarian that's obsessed with kicking people off places. Riding a boat and someone thinks it's a good idea to board the ship? He's getting kicked off. Some random dude looking into the nice view from a ledge? Sparta kick him. Another hobby of his is to force people eating disgusting things... especially goblins. Yeah, once the full game gets released, he's gonna make that one goblin with the worgs to eat the ♥♥♥♥. I almost feel sorry for the guy, I wonder how many barbarians have forced him to eat that ♥♥♥♥?

That being said, I was surprised that was even an option. I expected that at most you'd grab him and shove his face into the ♥♥♥♥, but never to make him to eat it.

[WeenerTuck813]

A Human Fighter Battlemaster Soldier background.

His backstory is, he was a soldier. And now he’s not.