What is your favorite character archetype to play?

Luke

Big fan of the tricksters. Thieves, rogues, illusionists, and scoundrels are best for me. Let me feel like I am tricking someone or getting away with something I shouldn't and I'm a happy player. Deception, stealth, distractions ... gimme some of that action.

Faye

I really love playing some aspect of myself, or to try out some aspect of myself. I have this internal representation of myself as a council of 10 people, and so exploring/indulging each of those individuals in roleplay has generally felt like a fulfilling personal growth exercise. In that way, roleplay activities have helped me explore my own gender identity in a really safe feeling way and definitely helped break open my egg. But more than that, roleplay has helped me explore other parts of my personality - embracing different types of darkness, leaning into vices, leaning into virtues, exploring failure and feelings and all sorts of stuff.

Kismet

I've recently been working on a character in a space pirate/Atlantis/Treasure Planet-themed campaign using the Fate System.

I've been having fun making a navigator-type character but designing the alien species that she comes from. Her species is one of the high up in the Empire (which is bad, of course, lol) and people don't typically see one of her kind on a ship that's not part of the Empire. So I'm thinking she was sent out as a secret agent for the Empire because they don't want anyone to know they are actively seeking the Treasure. So she is undercover as a Pirate, the ship's navigator, but is also a sort of historian and lore person.

I'm wanting to play her as a double agent, I think that being on the ship with this rag-tag band of friends has changed her underlying motivations but she has to keep up the act for her Empire contacts.

K.O.

Rogues archetypes are my favorite, for sure. I also love space pirates, bounty hunters, really any sort of scoundrel. My second favorite archetype is probably some sort of forest warden, like a ranger or druid.

My current main in a ttrpg is an elf courtesan who is an undercover spy for a rebellion to overthrow her corrupt government. She relies mostly on stealth and deception to make her way in the world. She also has Glamour magic, so she can disguise herself or use her powers to intimidate or shock in order to get away from dangerous situations.

joey

I like hapless and terminally unlucky characters. It's fun coming up with the fiction for a failed roll being crazy bad luck, and it turns failure from something that feels bad into something fun and expressive of your character.

I like any archetype that has some sort of quality to turn the inevitable failed roll into a character moment, really. I think it's a side of character building that alot of systems skip- especially wargame type systems like DnD- which naturally leads to power gaming and meta gaming, since a failure feels like a wasted turn otherwise.

The biggest thing I dislike in any game is when you try to do something and effectively nothing happens.

Hanzilla

Although I really love playing trickster/chaos fiend roles, the caregiver/guardian roles hold a special place in my heart. I especially like when those two things can be blended well, too. I think one of my characters I'm playing sort of does that, but she's mostly been leaning toward guardian of small cute critters than chaos demon trickster. She's got a lot of feelings goin' on.
I'm about to be playing a session of Wanderhome soon (highly recommend checking it out by the way) and I think I'm going to go full Guardian bear in that bad boy.

Mariano

Most of my experiences playing TTRPGs were in settings where we were seeking to laugh while going through the story. This led to me preferring to play characters that toe the line between dumb and incompetent, where they're not a liability to the party, but it's not far off.

This leads to funny and to-be-expected moments when there's a bad roll, and hype and unexpected lore-wise when the character pops off.

ladynightfyre

My favorites are the moms of the party, whatever the party needs in a mom. I have played the, grab your children (party members) by the scruff of the neck mom as well as the looking down her nose and destroying those who would insult her children with words and magic mom. They’re awesome

AGreaterMonster

I'm continually drawn to variety. Always picking something different from what I picked before. Usually I try to come up with some sort of personality hook to play that will make the character fun and engaging--something that will make it fun to roleplay with my teammates. Over the past couple years, I've played a Rogue inspired by The Punisher, a Wizard inspired by a noir detective, like Humphry Bogart from the Maltese Falcon, a Bard who was inspired by Oscar Wilde, a Barbarian who is mostly inspired by my ancestry choices--she's a Dhampir; a half-elf reborn as a half-vampire--she's a somewhat emotionless loyal warrior fascinated with death and undeath...kind of goth and dark but matter-of-fact.

So I think you can see, I'm all over the place!

Alexander Salkin

Non-healing support. Or at least support roles that aren't solely healing.

I enjoy using control-type abilities from a distance to steer the battlefield to help my companions. Failing that, I like off-tanking where I play the secondary frontliner to take pressure off of the main tank. Lastly, I enjoy mitigating damage to my companions. In D+D terms, that's usually an Abjuration Wizard's role or a melee type who can block damage on a reaction. I generally don't care to be a gloryhound, but I like quietly enabling others to succeed when I'm around them.

Aesthetics-wise, I like nature-y characters or those with a gift for music.

mianngu

@Alexander-Salkin

I'm the opposite! I love to be the healer. Cleric or druid usually. Though in my not so recent past I played a fighter (in two different campaigns) and that was a lot of fun. I enjoyed being the first into combat. The shield if you will.

Alexander Salkin

@mianngu I think I would enjoy healing more but I'm rarely in a situation where it gets appreciated, if that makes sense? Yes, the support roles I prefer aren't showy either, but I find people tend to like someone around who acts as a quiet backbone, so to speak.

As far as healing goes, it's mainly been wedged between D+D 5th edition and World of Warcraft. In the former, healing doesn't really keep up as easily in battle compared to older editions, I find. The players I've been with have regarded it as generally a poor use of an Action unless they're downed or floating around death's door on their last knee. So healing often becomes a yo-yo mechanic of getting other players out of death spiral or an out of combat thing.

In WoW, it was just DPS rudely screaming their heads off at the healer to constantly spam every bit of recovery while they ignored their threat levels. Not fun for me in that scenario.

I guess I just haven't found the right situations to enjoy the process.

mianngu

@Alexander-Salkin

You bring up some excellent points. I'm also familiar with that DnD 5e feeling of, oh I guess I'll cure wounds. In the beginning especially it felt like 3.5 just ate up spell slots with healing spells, but didn't deliver the bang that other classes got. People would die so easily that I didn't get to have ,let alone use, any utility spells.

Overall, it's probably my need "to mom" that makes me want to heal. It's good to be needed, even if you are invisible until they need you. Plus no queue wait time for healers (usually) in wow! Gotta love that!

Alexander Salkin

@mianngu said in What is your favorite character archetype to play?:

@Alexander-Salkin

It's good to be needed, even if you are invisible until they need you.

Well said. I really vibe with this particular statement, I gotta say.