Thread by @AlexandraErin

How to conceive of a TTRPG character (1/)

What's one thing your character is great at? What's one thing your character is good at? What's one thing your character is okay at? What's one thing your character is bad at? What's one your character can do that no one else can?

(2/) What are two things your character has going for them? What's something useful your character can do but doesn't want to do, and why? Who can your character always call on for help? Where will your character always go when called?

(3/) What does your character want out of life? What tempts your character? What frightens your character? What is your character's mission or quest? What would your character endure pain for? What would your character lose everything for? What would your character die for?

(4/) What kind of challenge most excites your character? What kind most frustrates or intimidates them? What is their preferred way to resolve a conflict? What is their measurement for success? What meaning do they take from failure?

(5/) What makes a fight worth fighting to your character? How far would they go to avoid one that's not? How would they do so? What kind of fight would they most prefer to (or least mind to) fight? How do they prefer to fight - by what means (weapon/style) and in what manner?

(6/) What would make them consider someone they meet on the road their enemy? What would make them mark someone as a friend? What are the lines they would not cross? What are the lines they want to think they wouldn't cross, and when might they cross them?

These are the kinds of questions I think players should think of when they create a character in a TTRPG, before they start formally designing their character and while they're doing it, and while they're playing.

I didn't write them out in any particular order except so far as one question suggested another question to my brain. I started off with just the first two tweets' worth, and those are the ones I think are more crucial at the beginning.

I know that a lot of roleplaying games including *the* one and many of its Assorted Descendants & Derivatives is not good, mechanically, at handling "one thing you can do that no one else can" (13th Age being a notable exception for encouraging this sort of thing)...

...but in those games such a question can also be a way to add color and texture outside the mechanics of character definition by focusing the answer on something that is more perpendicular to the rules, something homey and personal and not adventure-centric.

I mean, the concept of a ribbon -- which is a key component of 5E's design philosophy but not actually articulated in the game text -- is basically "the one thing you can do that no one else can" but on the character taxonomical level and not the personal level.