Make D&D great again

I’ve done the peasant farmer, who left his farm and took off to be a cleric. He never had the knack for farming like his brother, and when a passing cleric told him about the wonders of his deity, old Jeb was enthralled. The cleric was nice enough to even sell Jeb, promised to be the genuine article, his very own holy symbol for all Jeb’s coins and a pair of chickens. His brother said he was a gullible fool, but Jeb was sure he had seen his true path. Gave up the farm and hit the road looking for enlightenment. It was actually a fun character, too bad the campaign slowly died off because people couldn’t make it to the sessions.

Throwing a “fight” to a party member is the most badass version of bardic inspiration I can think of

Giant snails in 5e can be defeated by a Commoner throwing rocks. They have a speed of 10 feet and an AC of 15 while in their shell. The same trick even works on both versions of a Flail Snail, though it takes longer.

So I don’t know DND rules, nor the strengths of the classes.

But you could follow several European Monk blueprints:

• definitely a beer brewer
• Hildegard von Bingen Route: be a herbal healer and a bard
• Mendelssohn Route: have a knack for breeding peas, combine it with the fairytale of the giant beanstalk and you could have a handy getaway or bridging monk

Happy cake day!

I also played an ace bard (technically bardlock but whatever)! He was a satyr but deer instead of goat and the campaign had him slowly change from just a silly little guy to eventually taking the tragedy subclass. Very fun to play

Most of these are just gimmick characters that will have one fun interaction with the group and then become useless. They can be used for one-shots, but not full campaigns.

Like the dragonborn one, after the initial interaction where they explain the skin condition. Most players will just go “okay” and move on.

Except for the sentient hat one. That has a mystery attached and you can keep changing the mannequin throughout. Maybe it also works on a mop or barrel.

I basically did the farmer once. My character was a winemaker with barely any skills that would be useful on an adventure. When his sister’s fiance and that fiance’s cousin - both wizards - got invited to visit some rich uncle at the other end of the realm, he took the chance to see a bit more of the world. By the time they arrived, the uncle had been killed by demons and my character basically got stuck at “I want to go home” and “Can we just let the inquisition handle this?”

Edit: to be fair, this wasn’t D&D but The Dark Eye, so a lot more social and knowledge based skills that can make a non-fighting character useful.

A druid who got involved because they’re the party’s weed dealer.

Isn’t that the plot of Dazed and Confused?

A werewolf who doesn’t believe in the moon.

This would play out as an unintentional (or intentional) allegory for addiction, and the denial that masks it. The party would very likely form an intervention of some sort. I mean, they’d have to. After the third werewolf attack or so, it starts to become a real problem.

There’s also Brother Cadfael: a crime-solving sleuth from the 12th century. A high Wisdom stat is exactly what the Cleric class needs, so it would work out pretty well.

I think everyone tries fielding a commoner or “normal” person at least once.

My version was a nobleman’s son that just “wanted to try this adventuring thing out.” He wound up bankrolling the entire campaign, right up until he died in the second encounter.

Okay DM, I’m going to snort a line and monologue for a few minutes to get the party pumped up.

Ultimate Warrior was… Yeah, I don’t know how to finish that.

Cocaine is a helluva drug; the 'roids probably didn’t help much either.

That one is amazing, thanks for posting it!

The “that’s what my character would do” thing really sucks. If the other players don’t think it’s funny, and the DM doesn’t think it’s funny and often not even the player themselves think it’s funny (or replace funny with any other measure of worthwhileness), then why are they doing it? It’s not like the character is a living being that demands accuracy.

Crazy part is, that’s not the most unsettling and/or unhinged promo he did.

This is.

There’s a longer and better version of this that has a fanart of it

My sister has, no joke, played as a sentient fucking sandwich.

I had a guy play a combo of the sentient hat and farmer. A lich screwed up, was left as just a head, and his phylactery was the farmer. As the farmer got stronger the lich got weaker but more connected to the farmer, until the lich was very nearly fully in control of the farmer (fighter/rogue by that point) before the party found a way to remove the lich.