George and I had a great talk about character design opening up a series of choices during play. In a way, character design lays out the choices the player will make later in the game. Is my character strong? Do I envision my character doing a lot of strong things? Does my character know magic, and if so, what type? Design guides later choice.
Now let's look at less-optimal character design. These are choices you make during development that have no effect on the game later. A good example is buying the Craft (baskets) skill in a sci-fi game where basket weaving plays no part in the game later. Bad choices can be player afflicted, or they can come from the rules by design. Consider a derived character statistic that plays little or no role in the game, maybe it is a saving throw versus a particular class of magic item (rods), or a character statistic that is calculated but has an esoteric or specific use (the original Top Secret had Evasion and Deception statistics that were never described how they were used).
Another thing to watch out for is pigeon-holing a character in design, which would be like making a technician in the Original d20 Star Wars rules. Of course, your character was useful, but many players did not like being the character who was forced to stay behind and fix the starship while everybody else went out to explore the alien world. It's an extreme example, but it highlights a choice made in character design that puts your character in a disadvantageous position when it comes to play-time. This is a tricky subject, since you need to have a feel for the game's theme, how good the referee is at including fringe builds, and what the typical adventure is for the group.
In most pen-and-paper games, you can never go wrong with a combat-oriented class, but that is often the lowest common denominator in RPGs. If you think of more cerebral role-playing, like old-school Star Trek or even horror-based Call of Cthulhu, you can build characters out of the combat-trap. In the end it comes down to player choice and what's easiest for the group to support. If combat is the challenge, you will get more combat-geared characters. If the game and the group feel other non-combat play is valid, you will see build and adventure support for less traditional builds. When you think of 'choice' with character builds, you often have to consider the environment those choices are made in.
A key tactic to preventing pigeon-holing and meaningless choice is to tightly link character design to the world's theme. If you are playing intergalactic space pirates, focus the character designs on roles that would be active participants in the game world. Of course, space pirates have mechanics and cooks, but those classes are not central to the 'space pirate' theme you want for your game. You want classes that are out there, piloting ships, leading boarding actions, stealing cargo, and being a space rogue in the game world. Active roles beat passive roles - especially when playing with a group.
An interesting contrast are games like Pathfinder and D&D, where the referee needs to allow players to create 'adventurers' from any class printed in the books. Many times this turns out to be a challenge, as the referee is trying to figure out what a forest druid, inner-city thief, and paladin of the sanctuary are doing together. The theme of D&D type worlds is dungeons and treasure seeking, so many times these games assume a broad 'adventurer class' exists in the game world, which I have always felt is a little artificial and forced. I prefer my adventurers to be forced into being a hero, it inherently is more heroic and appealing, at least to me.
Think about motivations for creating characters, how things fit together, and the theme of your world. As an exercise, try designing a group of D&D characters who belong together, united by a single theme or purpose. Design should drive choice, and also focus on the fun.
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