Roasting my first D&D character (and fixing her)
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- Опубликовано: 1 июн 2024
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► Aisling playlist: • Aisling
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► INDEX
0:00 Intro
0:52 Aisling's backstory
3:10 Pablo speaks
4:42 Aisling's backstory pt2
7:13 Aisling's goal
9:15 Aisling's personality
12:50 Aisling's build
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Развлечения
Nyah :3
Google claims you've said 'undo' in some foreign language
I KNEW I RECOGNISED PABLO! Love your vids man, you two are the pillars of me learning about DnD
When I heard Pablo speak, I was like : Hmmmm... That sounds familiar🤔.Didn't know that pointyhat had a feline familiar lol.
Did you just cast counterspell in elvish?
Nyah X3
"A cool rock she found or a bird she killed."
Aisling is a cat, got it.
edgy characters are very often described as "cats" XD
That was the EXACT thought that went through my mind when she said that! LOL
@@sharkdentures3247 Torielas would gift a whole Rabbit with the Arrow still through its neck. but he died a hero to poison for the confirmed promise of love from the higher class woman who kept rejecting him. he was a Hero in the Evacuation efforts of Greeneporte. not a single enemy orc survived, but neither did he. he died not a lovesick hunter, but a lovesick hero. who had just enough strength to drop dead after telling his Anili, that he loved her, and that he will have to be her husband in the next life.
if she's anything like my old DM, she named Aisling after the fey girl from The Secret of the Kells, who can take the form of animals. this includes the Panger Ban, the cat.
You caught me, this entire video is cat themed. This is why Pablo shouldn't have a voice 😹
"If Eldritch Blast was so quintessential you wouldn't choose it, you'd get it automatically."
Funnily enough, the first rework of the OneDnD Playtest Warlock did exactly that.
And if that makes it into the new Warlock, then I will play Warlocks with Eldritch Blast. Until then, YOU'RE NOT THE BOSS OF ME 😤
3.5 made it a core aspect of the class, it was a class ability
@@GinnyDi 5e made it a core aspect of the class by making 5 of the invocations key off of having it as a cantrip. That's more than the "pact specific" invocations. Not taking Eldritch Blast because you don't think it's good is a mistake. Not taking Eldritch Blast despite knowing how good it is isn't a mistake, it's a choice. Just like multiclassing Warlock/Druid is only a mistake if you think it's going to be some crazy powerful build. If you're doing it because you want your character to be "more naturey", then it's actually a really good choice.
@@GinnyDi You don't have to anyway. Maybe that's how it's "meant" to be played, but if there are viable alternatives and table's ok,why not go without and just use EB on occasion.
@@GinnyDi Based on the last playtest, it's unlikely! While I still think EB is gonna be the "optimal" way to play, (more trigger effects) it's nice that they're opening up a lot of the EB Invocations to other cantrips. Assuming that change stays, anyhow.
Though bladelock is also looking better than ever and calls to me. I wanna make my psionic githyanki with her big ol' honkin' psychic damaging sword. Why cast spells when I can smash stuff as a caster? Spell slots are for smites!
Roasting a first DnD character who's a treehugging elf with the personality of a plastic cup? Oh, this was made for me.
Welcome!! ✨️
Reworking old characters is my favorite thing to do. You get to see how much your understanding of character building has gotten and you can keep coming with fresh ideas! I know one of my oldest dnd characters, Eva, has at least 5 variations. I don't think I can ever let her go-
That's awesome!! 🥰 Where did she start and what's she like now??
Not even DnD, but I've done the same thing with gaming characters over the years, all the way back to Ultima III. Somehow they keep coming back with modifications in fantasy as well as scifi roles.
@@rhaedas9085 I’ve done it with a Valkyrie in Bane of the Cosmic Forge, some PBM I can’t remember, a Vesten in 7th Sea, a Warrior in World of Warcraft, and most recently as a Barbarian when our group ran Rime of The Frostmaiden.
Great name for a D&D character 😊✨️
Yea i have a character like that. If the setting or group wouldn’t match her energy, i add her as an NPC to the backstory for the character i am playing 😅
ah yes, the character we gotta backpedal on. it happens to the best of us, but it’s better for us in the end
We have to do it to make the mistakes and create a more fun character in the future! 🥰
One of my first characters was a Rogue with a tragic backstory that I later reworked into a Ranger because Rangers are better.
Another of my first characters is an Eldritch Knight that needs a complete rebuild, but I don't know which direction to take her yet.
Most importantly, your love for Aisling was palpable and contagious in that old video, the mistakes be damn. It made her a good character no matter the cliche backstory. But it's cool to see her and her player grow so much! It's inspiring, thank you!
She was honestly a perfectly good character for the table she was at!! Just because I wouldn't write her the same way now doesn't mean she didn't serve her purpose 🥰
@@GinnyDi and that video of yours is what I constantly recommend people who think they have to make a good character whom others at the table will enjoy (like the warforged you played first) instead of the self-indulgent character they'll enjoy playing. So that video constantly serves its purpose, too!
I'm glad to know other people rework their old beloved but flawed characters. I also love the systematic way you analyzed, dismantled, and rebuilt Aisling.
I think you can do unfriendly and high Charisma. Instead of friendly, maybe they're fiercely compelling, people responding to the strength of the personality.
I created a high charisma I gave them a personality like Hyacinth Bucket from keeping Up appearances. an unlikable character but whos peronality just push her throu
Definitely! I talk about this in my video about roleplaying your stats. Aisling version 1 wasn't intimidating either, though - she was just awkward, and unfriendly. I certainly don't mean to imply that unfriendly characters can't be high charisma, but Aisling didn't demonstrate charisma in ANY way because I didn't work it into the way I formulated her personality.
@@GinnyDi Sorry, my misunderstanding.
Sociopaths. Compelling like the spider to its prey. You certainly don't have to be friendly to be charismatic. Some of the most vile people in history were incredibly charming. It is the reason that they were so successful with the scale of their atrocities.
I know a few standup comedians who are not friendly at all but have high charisma
Also: we see you Antonio Demico 😂❤
"Thanks to Antonio from PointyHat for voicing my cat" is indeed such a sentence and I love it so much! 😂💖
Pablo Picatso wears a Pointy Hat!
Sooooo do we need to go check out Pointy Hat for a reciprocal ad read?
A familiar voicing a familiar... uncanny...
@@DonsArtnGames uncatty? A tip of the hat.
I'm loving the Irish names on all of Aisling's NPCs! And your pronunciation is on point! You didn't exactly make it easy on yourself either: Roisín; Cian; Niamh!
My first 5E character was an inquisitive rogue with Batman’s backstory 😂 (in my defense, it was my DM’s suggestion and I was like, orphan who wants to kill the dragon that wiped out their village?! Sign me up!)
Incredible first character energy! 🤌
@@GinnyDi Great video on freshening up an old character. I really find that simpler backstories are often the best. It allows the game to shape the character more than what happened out of game. To use a literary example, in Dune, Frank Herbert doesn't give us a lot of backstory on Paul before he is thrust into the action of the story. And his time on Caladan is very short. Similarly, the life Frodo and Sam lived before the Ring came to Frodo wasn't terribly important--with the one exception that Frodo was a relation of Bilbo, and that earned him some good will from both elves and dwarves. Beyond that, his backstory was pretty unremarkable. We only got to know him through the events of the story. D&D characters are similar.
Had a mental image of a Dragon pulling a gun on your rogue’s parents in Crime Alley, with a Zorro movie poster in the background, until I read the rest of your comment…
@@AlexanderOsias I would watch that movie 😂
I love Pablo!!! That's funny how he reminds me of Pointy Hat ;-)
The resemblance is uncanny!! 👀
This is an excellent frame for teaching people how to avoid popular but problematic character creation choices by roasting your own. Just feels less like the speaker is lecturing people than simply saying, "This is what I learned through trial and error. Makes things better for me, it'll make it better for you." Even though that is what you are always saying, but...we can't help how people take stuff. Plus, the specificity and editing in real time I think makes it all crystal clear. Really great stuff.
I remember my first character. She was a 3.5e bard who was planned to go down the Dragon Disciple prestige class, and who had these profound visions of loud, raucous music that made her incredibly unpopular but very skilled with her lute. This is because I thought the name Dragon Disciple sounded like a cheesy 80s power metal band, and so she was seeing visions of actual power metal bands and trying to play that kind of music on medieval instruments. Her arc ended up with her trapping a lightning elemental in a lute that was a flying V. I... honestly kind of love her, and I'd play her again in a heartbeat.
Some of us are just born talented huh...
I love all of this!
Gods, she's me. That's why I liked her so much. "Oh, now that I trust you, I went from 10% to 100% really quick and now it's weird. Here, have this rock I found." Glad to see Aisling back, Ginny!
"I wanted to be cute and have elf ears."
Same. My first character I had to be an elf and I desperately wanted magic, so enchanter sounded fun (in 2nd edition, elves could only be enchanter mages). But, I was in my reading the Prydain Chronicle phase and so she also had to look like Princess Eilonwy - just with elf ears. I gave her a true love, an older twin brother, a family who only saw girls for how and hearth and gave her just a little bit of a rebellious nature (which I almost immediately ignored upon starting the campaign as she morphed more and more into myself at 17, very introvertedand u certain of herself) and I had her run away from home to become an apprentice enchanter. Oh, and she was also a horse girl, lol.
I've thought about redoing her as a 5e character. It might be really interesting to see how far I've come as a player. And I feel the same about bringing her to a new table. Maybe solo playing her could be fun! Excited to see how your campaign goes with Aisling 2.0!
First, and most importantly - this video is AMAZING. I remember some of my early characters and the vast majority of them came directly from Cringeville. It's really fun to get some perspective and revisit them to dig into what I was actually going for and clean off all the edgelord garbage that cluttered them up. Second, your hair and makeup look INCREDIBLE.
SECONDED 🎉
Thank you!!
I love the term Cringeville 😂 I hope my early characters are super happy there
Hey, if characters from Cringeville appealed and got you playing and enjoying the game, more power to you. If it worked for you and it worked for the group you were in, there's nothing wrong with younger you enjoying a more tropey approach.
Today on: The Bob Ross of DnD and the Relatable content...
It was SO cathartic to me to actually redo an entire PC from one of my favorite games. It's crazy how looking at a character after so many years can bring up so many questions and mistakes.
I love this walkthrough of how to rehabilitate a character, especially the part of how to make sure you have those npc connections and ability to interact with the players, such as the pseudodragon part. The "make your DM quit" was real chef's kiss.
I loved editing that - I'm glad people are seeing it! It's JUST past my normal viewer retention time 😂
10:47 This. Thank you SO much for saying this. Just because it's difficult doesn't mean it's *impossible* to create this kind of character, or that it *has* to be unpleasant to play at the table. One of my characters most dear to my heart is an edgelord loner, and it's been such an amazing story to explore how he's coming to slowly trust his party members. He provides them with some perspective on life, and they provide him with a place where he can really feel trusted and valued as a person. It's godsdamn beautiful.
Aisling is back!!
Also i thought in the og video you said there was a warforged before her, so iirc not technically the first character
Wow incredible memory! 🤯 Yes, Aisling was /technically/ not my first character, but I only played Petra (the warforged monk) for a short time, and Aisling was the first character I really committed to. I consider Petra more of a practice character 😜
@GinnyDi We've all had that character. My very first was a Barbarian with an 18 strength, 6 intelligence, and 4 wisdom...
He got pretty boring as the table was more of an explorer/role-playing kind...
@DonsArtnGames my first was a Dragonborn who's name was charizard spelled backwards, he didn't do much because the party self destructed and I was just sitting back and watching then kill each other
You're the first creator to make ads I actually enjoy. And I don't know how I feel about this.
She's the second for me, Let's Game It Out ads were a wild ride before his sponsors started requiring him to not mock random stuff so much
As someone who is making a character for the first time, I worry about how I’ll look back at her down the line.
It’s so nice to see Aisling again, and that more is to come, I loved learning about her before, and she’s still so much fun.
I hope that even if you look back on them with a critical lens, you still loved playing them! That's certainly how I feel about Aisling 🥰
@@GinnyDi I think I will, I hope so anyway. She’ll definitely be dear to me no matter what, and I think that’s what’s gonna be important.
Me too. LOL. My first has been a struggle to flesh out the back story. Kinda understand now that there are distinct disadvantages to the "lone wolf" and will need to do some thinking about changing that up a bit.
To me the answer to the lone wolf is to answer what it takes to no longer be lone and attribute that to someone else in the party.
Maybe you want revenge? Someone else might also want revenge or protection from the object of your vengeance.
Maybe you want money? Someone else can be a noble willing to bankroll you if you help with the task at hand.
The long and short of it is to have at least one connection to the party and have the DM know that he can send a character moment both your ways at once and you both have each other to bounce ideas and rp off of.
It's also a really organic bond to have. Your character might be uninterested in large groups of friends or allies, but having an accomplice or even a patsy... just makes sense.
Clicked sad that Aisling was being effectively killed off. Now i know she is being reborn!! The bew Aisling is perfect!! Good job Ginny!
I’m currently trying to go against a trope, and have a rogue *with* parents. This idea spawned when I saw the groundbreaking amount of people who had parentless rogues; so I opted for one who had parents, but they were poor, so she had to work as a mercenary to send them money for food. I know Aisling is a Warlock/Druid, and not a rogue but this just made me think of my own character (who is a backup, mind you. Her name is Niche and she’s a yuan-ti pure blood).
Multiclassing for the sake of having new toys to play with because you only have one character at one table is extremely relatable.
My DM and close friend made it a requirement that before we joined his game we had to answer a list of questions he gave us. These questions are so we can develop a characters backstory along side the DM. He does this with every new character, so backup characters get the same treatment. Honestly, it's genius and really helpful.
That sounds cool and helpful. May I ask for some examples of those questions? I may want to steal, i mean re word them for my own nefarious purposes
@@alexholloway6113
10. Do you have a name for the town Opus was created in? If so, what?
11. Any specifications for who Opus sold the shop to? Given this amendment, did Opus still leave his community the same day he became self-aware?
12. Did Opus' community at large see him once he became self-aware? If so, what would've been their reaction?
13. Is there anything else (NPCs, flavoring, experiences, etc.) that you wish to specify about the character?
@@devonhappe I thanketh thee, shall consider using similar questions. Happy dnding
@@alexholloway6113 you're welcome.
@@devonhappe I swear half your comment is missing 😭 just asking cause I’m also curious
Cian and Niamh sound like potential love interests for Aisling just based on tropes alone. Love triangle waiting to happen. The drama!
My first characters definitely have similar issues. Neither my paladin nor my sorcerer know any NPCs within their respective games because I was a latecomer to both campaigns.
I'm surprised you're not making her a Baldur's Gate 3 character, but I guess it wouldn't really work with the goal that you have in mind. I look forward to seeing how Aisling's story goes.
I LOVED THE POINTY HAT CAMEO ❤.
also, this video is one of my favorites now!!
my first dnd character was a 7 foot orc named Ron (short for Ronald) he worked in a mine as a child and left mostly because people we're to scared of him outside of that he loved bread and MURDER!
That sounds like a GREAT first character 🤩
@@GinnyDi it really was for now my main character (a work in progress) is just Rasputin but in dnd
Also the ad read is giving Futurama!!!!!!! With the “you been living here for 3 years and you choose to talk now?!?!”
I will also say - I feel like something that a lot of people fundamentally misunderstand about trauma is that it can do one of two things - it can either make you bitter, or it can make you better. You can be a person with a nightmarish backstory and nobody knows it because you're just so nice. As a person with horrible childhood trauma and CPTSD as a result of that, people are always genuinely shocked to find out some of the things that I have gone through. I never want to treat people the way I was treated, but as a result, I tend to over-correct. I also tend to hide my true feelings behind a mask of peppy positivity. I don't always get mad, but if I do, I absolutely hulk out because it usually means I was pushed way too far, or I saw someone hurting another person or animal. I definitely have more flaws, but these are some ways you could have a super traumatic backstory and still play someone who can interact well with the party and others.
The older I get the more charming I find it when people still feel affection for their early characters. There's a writer/video game developer named Anthony Huso who played of D&D a lot in the 80s as a teenager and came back to it in the 2010s as a middle aged man. Since then he has published a number of modules on Lulu, his first being an "adulted up" update of a plane-spanning inn he used in high school. Included are a couple characters a professional writer would never dare come up with, especially the hot, friendly moon elf bard Rain whose hair changes color depending on her mood. A lot of critics gave him flak for that, but I thought his affection for that character was so palpable and had so much history behind it, that I find it charming.
Ok, so you have a talking cat - big deal. Who doesn’t? But, aren’t we overlooking something here? I never saw the cat’s lips move once! That’s not a talking cat - that’s a talking VENTRILOQUIST cat with some serious mad skills!
Now I’m inspired to do a little more with some of my first concepts. My first concept-which I never got the chance to actually play-fell into a lot of the same traps as Aisling did, so I should dig her back up and fix her. One of these days, I’ll actually play Raiann the dragonborn ranger, and she’ll do great things, far greater than 15-year-old me could ever dream of!
The voice at 14:41 made me spit out coffee. Thank you for making this clip, and dealing with bad builds with care and insight!
I love this because you can see in her eyes as she reads it, envisioning every bad backstory she's ever had to look over, and die a little inside when she remembers she wrote this, lol.
Watching this both excited and paranoid because of how many mistakes im probably making with my first dnd chr 😅😅😅 but the whimsy in my heart is there so....YIPPEE
THE BACKSTORY IS ALREADY CALLING ME OUT OOPS
We all have problems with our first characters. It's a rite of passage and something to be proud of 😂💪
Funny that you brought up your solo video again, I *just* got done using those books (that I bought because of you) to deal with an unexpected dungeon crawl and I just got the itch to do a solo run too (though using pathfinder 2e instead as a system) and doing it with, essentially, a frankenstein-like monster build.
Also, the Lady of the Soil is a perfectly fine being of the Fae. My first dnd 5e Warlock was a servant of the Queen of the First Morning. (which basically meant her powered waxed and wane depending on how rare the morning was). So a fae lady who listen to the soil is more than fine imo.
Also, just because it hits my brain during the videos, previous editions of the Warlock (3rd/3.5) *had* Eldritch Blast has an automatic mechanic with very similar invocation to modify it. You could do some *weird* mechanics thing with other stuff too.
I had to pause cause I was laughing so hard at Antonio as your cat. Best ad break ever!
Video was getting a like anyway, but I had to comment in praise of the voice acting choice for your cat. I particularly loved the closing bit about the cat's dinner and wasting away along with that touch of Spanish at the end, *chef's kiss*. I get similar vibes from my dog when it's dinnertime. Also, when we have company over he gives, "These terrible people give me zero affection ever in all of the history of time!" energy.
My first and current character is also a Warlock Druid!
Worst is, I first made her a Warlock sorceress but as soon as I could level up, I asked the DM to switch to Druid, thinking I could sacrifice physical stats thanks to wildshape... Not realizing 14 AC is not that much better than 10 😂
The good thing is her medium stats have brought a lot of really funny failures to the table, like making unconvincing illusions or having just a bunch of contextual cantrips, like giving a blooming flower as a gift to a giant, only to realize it's so tiny in their giant hands 😅
She also had a really tragic and convoluted backstory that I simplified and lightened up once I understood how to make it useful for the DM. He immediately started incorporating the new story into the game which felt great!
As always, I love your thoughts on writing and creating characters. Sometimes it is interesting to go back and look at an older character. The Main Character in my first book, which I started coming up with in High School, was very much a nerdy teen boy fantasy, outcast of his people turns out to be the scion of a much more powerful group, and sets off on an adventure to save the world. Much of my editing as I got into my twenties and before I published it at 30 were making that a more mature vision, while still staying true to what I wanted the character and story to be. It is a hard balance sometimes.
It sounds like your Aisling character is basically a cat, lol.
Loved the Promo, you always bring some much humor and creativity to them, which I really like!
You taught me a thing here as a DM too: That new players at my table won't necessarily use their own back stories at all, and I need to be alright with that.
Ah, the age old lesson of "Everything you learn starts with a mistake". Those first characters are absolute crash courses of not just D&D, but TTRPGs in general. Another wonderful video Ginny! I cannot wait to hear about the exploits and adventures of Aisling v2.0.
This video made me realise how long i've been following you for. Honestly I was so inspired by Aisling I made my own character inspired by her, Aurelia. She really fit the sexy and sad vibe and sadly really didn't fit the world... Or my type of playing, lol
The second the cat started talking I was like “is that Pointy Hat but even more Spanish?” Glad to see I was right 😂 and well done on the talented performance of your cat!
Gonna use this advice to avoid these mistakes, for my own traumatized pretends to be tough ranger.
Also my birdfolk paladin would like you to know that cool rocks are one of the best gifts, only second to pretty rocks.
I actually just started playing solo D&D after being inspired by that previous video, so I am THRILLED to know you will be keeping at it and reviving Aisling for that format. (Also, not only do you look fabulous in this video, but you just have this infectious energy that can be felt through the screen. Even though you were critiquing your own creation, it just seemed like you were having a good day that day, and I’m all for it. 😊)
I recently remade one of my early D&D characters who committed the sin of having 100 years of experience (due to being an eladrin) despite being, like, level 3 in the campaign she was briefly in before it fizzled out. A friend inviting me to a level 20 one-shot was the perfect opportunity to fix her while keeping all the things I originally loved about her, it was so rewarding!
I support the "warlocks don't need eldritch blast" claim. My warlock is high char & str, uses a glaive, pact of the Blade. Her signature move is booming blade, if it needs more oomph I'll use eldritch smite. Can't reach a target? Quickened cast fly as a bonus action thanks to metamagic adept, or swap places with another willing creature thanks to the noble genie patron feature. It's fun playing outside the standard expectations of a class :)
This approach is even more fun with recurring antagonists. Vexxan Naziir has seen several iterations over the years, but now has so much more depth, believability, and temperance; he has become the intimidating enemy players fear not because he's a giant poser trying to be a badass anymore, but because his goals, methods, and presence are truly disturbing.
I’m so glad you made this video because I just got done revamping one of my favorite and oldest PCs, a Goliath College of Valour bard. Didn’t really understand bards or spellcasting that much when I first created him but he grew on me. I started learning that bards are better at support than raw DPS, so I started leaning that way more and more during my first campaign. Sadly, I ended up leaving that one due to some inter-player conflicts, but was able to bring my bard into a new campaign where the DM was wonderful about letting me re-spec him, now that I have a better idea of how to play him better. I even worked my departure from the old campaign into his backstory for the new one, justifying the re-spec and starting back over at a lower level as my bard choosing to go his own way and starting over on a new path (with some references to other players/PCs in the old campaign whom we’d become really close with). Anyway, I’m having such a fun time with my Valour Bard 2.0, haha. Thanks for validating me with your video!
Great video! Introspection is great!
I think multiclassing for the aesthetic is a great reason. Really, in almost any character choice, "I want to" is a perfectly valid reason.
I played a warforged bard, and took magic initiate at level 4. Why? His backstory was warforged were mass produced low level wizards. A wall of firebolts, even with low to-hit-bonuses. He was very middling.
He just wanted to be an actor.
This got me thinking of characters I made in high school who were largely based on anime I would watch on TV and JRPGs. Then you mentioned that you made Aisling when you were 28 and I realized that I was still getting a grasp on making good characters then too.
That point about eldritch blast being given automatically if it was so essential is a good point. In fact, for one of the barbarian subclasses I homebrewed, it not only gets access to eldritch blast as part of a spell list under a custom category called Ragecast, but is even given that cantrip for free. Ragecast spells being spells that meet certain criteria, and the Ragecaster barbarian is able to cast them while raging. Criteria includes stuff like not being a concentration spell, having a cast time short enough to finish casting on the same turn it starts getting cast on (1 action, 1 bonus action, or 1 reaction), having a duration no longer than 1 round, and either lacking material components, having a melee weapon as its material component, or being able to use a focus in place of its material components.
I feel like this video doubles as a therapy episode for your character and I love it
I think mean/standoffish can work but you definitely have to have some kind of aligned goals that would encourage the party to put up with you.
I played a temporary character for part of a campaign during the Curse of Strahd section, and he was fully neutral evil (ruthless and amoral, rather than cackling maniac), a bit condescending and critical, and very much not willing to risk himself to save others, but he wanted to lift Strahd's curse (to study it, because reasons) and knew things that could help. It was a lot of fun to play a less talkative, more calculating character after playing the party's face for a while.
Totally agree 💯 Having a common goal or a close relationship with another member of the group makes life SO much easier
@@GinnyDi Another thing I found worked quite well for my character is I established early on that he was very blunt and didn't lie, so while he reserved his right to keep personal secrets, there was still a basis of trust.
It was also really fun to roleplay a character that always tells the truth but has things he'd like to keep to himself, so I got very good at answering a question with a different question, or saying things in a way that's *technically* true.
Great timing on this video! My first ever character was created in 2020, a gnome bard. We played two sessions…. And just played the third last night. It’s fascinating to get to revisit him. I’ve got lot of lawful good people in that party, but my bard is more chaotic good. We’re obviously still finding the party dynamic, but I figure I’m going to “balance” the party a bit by leaning into being the mischievous truth-bending prankster.
Oh, and my character spent nearly the entire session last night tied to a ship’s mast. He was repeatedly failing his wisdom saves against a bunch of sirens… but everybody left him tied up for hours after the encounter had ended. 😂😂😂
Pablo: "¿Como pudiste hacerme esto Virginia?"(How could you do this to me Virginia?) 😸
I absolutely loved this video!
It was so funny! Really well edited the like “youtube shorts” edit towards the end was perfect!
Also the Pablo commercial was so funny!
And I loved that you could tell he was watching the toy or snack or something behind the camera hehehe
We've all made a D&D character solely for the aesthetic. Some of us never get beyond aesthetic.... I fully expected you to go back in time and reprimand yourself 😂
Thank you for being brave enough to say "Warlocks don't need to have _Eldritch Blast"!" I have been fighting against taking the spell for over a year in a Curse of Strahd campaign. Taking out that staple of the class means you have to get more creative! It's a fun challenge!
One last thing, we stan sad & hot characters 🔥😎😭😎🔥
This has to be one of the best concepts for a video ever. This is amazing. Well played, Ginny. Well played!
I've liked you ever since you gave me the reward for "Technical Achievement" in the WorldAnvil Costume Challenge. Your words of motivation and justification for the award was really well put, and I decided to subscribe. Never regretted it.
We just ended a campaign and one of my friends bought a reskinned version of a warlock he played in a previous fizzled game to our table. I think the difference in campaigns allowed his concept to mature into something entirely different that we were all narratively satisfied with at the end of the campaign.
Listening to this, I think it'd be a fun little exercise to take this type of character from the DM's perspective and try to make it work. Like, trying to stick as much to the original concept, but also making it work for other things. Like, "the rot is impossible to stop", the first thing that comes to my mind isn't to make it a "some people think it's impossible, other's don't", but to play onto the "no, it's impossible", having aisiling constantly be told that while OOC the player and DM know that's not the case, so they can feel OK with Aisling staying stubborn, and that, in the end, getting rewarded, when they e.g. find out of a hidden thing in history where the rot occured but was stopped. Heck, that could even be tied into a) why aisling's fam is being so shunned (maybe their ancestors stopped it at great price) or b) the soil lady, who maybe thinks that the way it was ended wasn't the best way.
Excited to hear about how playing a solo campaign goes for you! I'm currently trying it out for myself using Mythic and GURPS, and I'm having fun. Hard to find info about solo roleplay outside of Me, Myself and Die and your one video on the subject (that I re-watch from time to time). Whether it goes well or poorly, it'll be nice to have more content out there. Hope you enjoy it!
"she's guarded at first, but the moment somebody proves themself trustworthy, it's like a switch flips and now they're one of the clan. She becomes fiercely loyal and protective, and potentially even too attached, maybe giving them gifts that feel normal to her but are super weird to non elves like a cool rock or a bird she killed"
So a cat. Aisling's new personality is cat. She will be adopted by a party for sure.
OMG I HAD A CAT CALLED PABLO!!! He's not with us now and he was older than me, my first friend really. Love that grumpy ball of undying determination, great name for a cat too. Great videos too, though I don't play D&D, but as soon as I find a group (and a little social confidence) I'm going to be so pumped because of your videos.
This breakdown is amazing. LOVE the eldritch blast comments! Can't wait for the solo adventure video with Aisling. Awesome video!
I did something like that with my current character! She was so fun to play, but the campaign fizzled out when she was level 10. When another friend of mine started up a game, I decided to play a variant, starting at level 1, and made different choices. I still love playing her.
It's pretty funny how whenever someone talks WorldAnvil the maps are all, without exception, Inkarnate
Thank you for this video. Playing my first round of D&D with some strangers. For reasons including DM advice, I'm a wood elf druid... but with the "urchin" background from whichever book edition we are referencing. With no time to prep background before an intro session for me and the other newbie, I leaned into the edgy silent type bc I was too sleep deprived to improvise and also trying to figure out how much roleplay would be in this group (made harder bc the other newbie seems to know way less about D&D than I do, especially any focus on roleplay.) On a first meeting, she kept her hood up and didn't say much, so I can now puzzle things out a bit. I'm a very creative person who has read a lot of books, but I haven't gotten 6 hours in days. I will gladly use this advice to guide me. I really want to avoid cringe when this group might care little for background anyway.
I agree with you that EB is far from necessary for a good Warlock build. It's useful in a blaster build with the range, damage die, and damage type, but not essential. Hexblades can get up close and personal, Tomelock can get any other great attacking cantrip, and Chainlocks can use familiars to deliver touch cantrips from a distance. Plus Chill Touch, Mind Sliver, and Toll the Dead are all great cantrips. Limited spell slots doesn't just mean a warlock needs to blast away!
Omg is that Pointy Hat Antonio???? OMG IT IS. This is my immediate favorite Ginny Di video.
1. Amazing of you to go back to a previous character. I'd never be that brave, even if I have played since 2000.
2. Full Solo with Aisling? Hawt damn! Are you sure you don't want to make a chapter series of your solo game?
Also. That cat is smart not to speak more often. Pablo would charm the world with his gentle tones and feline fabulousness!
My first 5e character actually had a very interesting concept for her backstory: she was a shieldmaiden and war veteran turned into a university professor and a reputable archeologist, who ended up losing her job after all of her research got discredited by a fellow academic (and spouse). She was so humiliated by it that she had a nasty breakup with her, and changed her identity to wander the region doing odd jobs before meeting the party. The problem is that I made her a College of Valor Bard because I wanted some magic while I played her as a Fighter because she was more of a Shieldmaiden. I didn't fix that by multiclassing her or anything, I just went on with it until the end. When I switched to Pathfinder 2e temporarily, I brought her into the original concept through the Dual-Class option, and still didn't tap into the magic, making her more of a Fighter than a Bard. Now I just want to build her again, this time going fully martial. As for her personality, I pretty much ignored it altogether after writing it up. In my defense though, it was a hack and slash campaign with a story that, while it wasn't ignored, it went a bit in the background and developed mostly through downtime.
I love how people always say they like "the pointy ears" about the elf aesthetic when several other D&D races also have those, halflings being the main/most common one. But halflings aren't hyper skinny, which is what these people are all actually after, so they never play them...
Halflings have pointy ears? I thought that was gnomes?
@@Kronosaurus-1924 Actually now that you're saying it, maybe this is an element they changed when they got sued by the Tolkien estate for stealing Hobbits, I'm not sure. But Hobbits have them.
Maybe gnomes do too, idk. And Ginny has played a deep gnome in the time since then, because they're also skinny, so that tracks I guess.
Pointy hat voicing the kitty is perfect😻😻😻😻😻
That last point about not wanting to play your character under a new DM really struck a chord. My very first character (built in a friend's homebrew system) was made way back in the early '90s, and I do absolutely cringe at the things that teenaged Klasodeth thought were cool. But what I regretted most was my shameless power-gaming.The DM really had to put up with a lot of headaches from that original group, particularly from me. So when an unusual combination of events presented the opportunity to play the character again under the same DM after nearly three decades (except this time in D&D 5e), I found that I was rebuilding my character to act as an apology of sorts. No more bloodthirst for combat, no endless ambitions for power, no shameless exploitation of loopholes, and no insistence on pushing rules past the breaking point. Just a character that became victim of their own hubris, powerless and trapped on a distant world, wanting only to return home.
I wanted to prove that things had changed, but I was so afraid of having the DM think I was going to try to break the game again due to those past transgressions that I didn't give the DM the whole backstory and had the character operate under an alias. (It made sense within the narrative of the campaign.) There was also an element of risk. Since the character was trying to accomplish their goals purely within the framework of the system, without the benefit of the DM nudging events in any particular direction, there was a real possibility that the character would not achieve a happy ending. The central conflict of the campaign had the potential for events that would make it impossible for the character to return home, and the rules surrounding resurrection were unforgiving enough that if my character died, they would probably stay dead, which I was prepared to accept as the canonical end of my character's story. For me, that was pretty significant, as this character was part of a campaign that resulted in lasting friendships that persist to this day, so my character, flawed though it was, held a great deal of significance for me. From my perspective, I was giving the DM back much of the power over the game world and my character that I had taken away in that first campaign.
Throughout that campaign, I left subtle clues about the true nature of my character, and during the epilogue at the end of the campaign, when my character finally accomplished everything needed to return home, I finally revealed the truth. I had been worried that the DM might not react well to the revelation, but everything turned out so well that in our current campaign, I'm now openly playing another character from that campaign.
This time, the goal is to add some actual personality to a character that was previously a blank slate, and the results have been quite rewarding, especially since I get to draw on a rich backstory that was developed by years of prior gameplay. I've greatly enjoyed being able to redeem two characters by making them into much more than what I could have done for them when I originally created them, made all the better by continuing from their original stories instead of overwriting them. And I got to show my original DM that I've been learning from my mistakes.
This brought back memories of a deep gnome from third edition, 22 years in the past.
I promise you your first character was dramatically better than mine.
9:30 Just wanted to mention that Intimidation is a Charisma skill, too. Not all high Charisma characters have to be smooth talkers, some can have a commanding presence, and a grandeur or gravitas to their character that makes them persuasive.
One of my newest characters is a very Diablo necromancer-inspired guy who speaks in a very monotone voice and appears outwardly expressionless and stoic. He's very different on the inside and has a very strong sense of duty. He's a warlock, so his second highest stat is Charisma. I resolved this by giving him proficiency in Intimidation and letting him have just a very upfront and matter-of-fact way of speaking; he's strong-willed and means everything he says, and has the force of personality to back up his statements.
Of course, this doesn't mean you *have* to act your stats if you feel like they limit your roleplaying, but to me they're good guidelines to work around when developing my characters.
Sidenote, this video makes me feel better about my first roleplaying character. He was a bit chosen one-y, but I thought my idea of having innate divine power and having this guy want to study it and develop it further with wizard things was fun. (Divination Wizard/Divine Soul Sorcerer)
My current campaign character is in fact a sexy and sad Warlock/Druid who started the campaign as a loner, and I genuinely enjoyed watching this 😂 I have an amazing DM who I've worked closely with on my backstory, ans for only my second campaign character, I feel pretty proud of how her story is unfolding 😁 in a Corpse Bride type of situation, her husband murdered her a few weeks after their marriage, then she was revived by The Raven Queen and at about the year mark in the campaign became the new Champion! Her name is Karliah Nightingale (based on a character in Skyrim) and I love her w my whole heart 💜
Also, fun fact: the random D20 I got w this year's calendar bundle was Aisling's, and I didn't actually know anything about her character until watching this today! Now I'm in love with the synchronicities of our characters and feel like the Universe had you pick that D20 for a reason 🥰
The rarity of elves reminds me of a home brew system I played where humans dominated. In character creation, we rolled a d4 to determine if you were non-human. If you rolled a one, you could choose non-human. After that, you kept rolling. The number of ones of ones you rolled in a row, determined what tables you could choose from.
Magic users were also rare and required one on a d4, but there was no additional rolls.
And now I'll hear Antonio when my cats are expressing their desire for food too... great video as well. The first character is usually the hardest and could always use a revision.
In the end, my first D&D character was exactly the character I wanted to play. She's a human variant life cleric with War Caster and Skilled who fled a Sharran Cult and became a cleric of Selune. We are finishing up her campaign tomorrow and I am at once happy and heartbroken 💔 love you, Fawn. Hope you don't die tomorrow.
LOL, Ginny was always a joy, even with hindsight.
i'm gonna do this to my tiefling rogue. her build is absolute chaos (i was new to d&d) and her backstory is trope after trope.
This video is amazing: the content, your makeup and outfit, the montage and even the ad... Everything is just perfect. I enjoyed every second of it and went back to the moment you swear just to enjoy that little sound and stars twice. Perfect! 😅
It's so funny, I'm solo playing my "first" character (I'll explain the quotes) right now, too. I tried a few times to get the character right, but it didn't have any personality (I was learning mechanics). The first tries were in 3.5, all half elves, all orphans, mostly male etc. Then, when 4th came out, I tried once. It was bad, but I was getting ideas. Then, we sorta combined 3.5 and 4e into what we called "3.75" and my boy just clicked. The first tiefling of his line (his dad made the deal, cuz we lived in a magocracy and dad wanted to be allowed to have rights). Braelen (my character) was born without inherent magical power, as per his dad's deal, but backstory shenanigans with a dragon, *bam* he's a sorcerer. The shenanigans caused him to be dispossessed and exiled from home blah blah blah. I'm working on that backstory, too. I have dubbed him my first character, because he's the one I was looking for when I made all those others, and none of them had personality. They were stat nlocks, not characters. Braelen came out with a personality I didn't even expect, being young when he left (17), he was impulsive. Given the obvious issues he would have with his father (and a few that aren't so obvious), he had a chip on his shoulder the size of Texas, and was quick to get pissed. Add that to the brand new abilities he (a teenager) had with fire (gold dragon, so fire themed), and oof. I also played the "product of dystopia" thing where he didn't fundamentally understand how things work outside, tempered by the fact that he did travel some, before. Also, he had an entrepreneurial attitude that helped me play around his anger. If he smelled money, he got a lot more chill and less likely to try to burn things. In an adversarial situation, though, the boy is unhinged, and I love that 😂
I'm so curious about Aisling's solo adventure, please tell us more when you can!
I love the sentence "weird, rat eating fantasy"
I love this new penguin pebbling Aisling
The biggest mistake I'd realized I'd been making in a number of my character builds was that they often lacked a personal goal they wanted to achieve. And while I usually bake a number of things into their backstories that could be used to incite interesting story - I realized during my last campaign that not having a goal that I was specifically trying to work towards took away from my ability to engage with whatever overarching plot hook was in front of me, because nothing felt like an obstacle to my character, everything was just "something to do" in the moment. It made his reactions to setbacks very lukewarm and also never gave him a reason to want to slow down at any point, he was just always ready to trigger the next major event flag, and I realized that that affected my ability to be invested in my own character's growth.
Reworking old characters is always fun, and sometimes easier than coming up with an entirely new character.
I've been a part of several campaigns that fell apart due to scheduling conflicts, so I have a decent roster of character concepts that I could re-work when I join a new campaign.
Hi. I'm a pedantic detail-oriented roleplayer who mostly plays survivalist characters (rangers and survival-expertise rogues are my go-to). I know it's not the point of the video, but I caught on the raw rabbit detail, and I can't move past it until I write an essay. So let me just say, for future reference: if you're ever eating a raw rabbit for sustenance, you are *bad* at wilderness survival.
Starting a fire is actually pretty easy once you know what you're doing - doesn't even take flint necessarily. You can do it if you have two sticks and a knife. You can even do it in the rain, you just need to find a dry place - which aren't as difficult to find in the woods as you would think. In close to the trunks of some trees you'll be able to find dry spaces where you can build a makeshift fire pit in a hollow between the roots. The dry area might not be wide enough to shelter you *and* the fire. You'll be sitting in the drizzling water coming down from the canopy, but you can afford to be damp if you're damp and warm. (Don't worry, the fire won't ignite the tree. It takes truly enormous amounts of energy to set a large living tree on fire.) And once you've got that fire started, you should start working on some shelter next anyway, so you won't be in the rain for long.
As for being too risky, sure, there will be some times where that's true. But that's what trail rations are for. Worst-case scenario, if light and smoke would seriously put you in danger and you have no prepared food on-hand, forage for some nuts and roots. Don't spend too long on it - the goal is to just get enough energy to get you out of danger. An hour of walking off-road burns something like 350 calories, 500 if you're really roughing it through the underbrush. That's half a cup of nuts. One fairly small tree will provide that, so if you find one food source per hour - a pretty reasonable expectation for a decent survivalist - you can pretty much keep walking until exhaustion takes you down.
Raw rabbit will not help. It has very few calories even when cooked, and uncooked meat takes more energy to digest. Cooking, among other things, can be thought of as pre-digesting food, breaking down long-chain proteins and carbohydrates with thermal energy rather than using the chemical energy in your body. Raw meat also extremely tough and has to be chewed for several minutes before it can be safely swallowed, which takes even more calories. I don't know off the top of my head how much energy it would take to chew and digest raw rabbit meat, but my guess is that it would probably be more than you would get out of it, so you would actually *lose* energy by eating the meat.
Regardless. Realism is not always the correct way to approach fantasy. I understand why 28-year-old Ginny wrote Aisling's tragic backstory the way she did. But for future reference, the mark of a capable survivalist is that they are able to survive *comfortably* in the wilderness. Surviving uncomfortably is, generally, unsustainable, as whatever is causing discomfort will also be draining your resources and energy.
I was about to ask if Pointy had was the cat, but you provided the answer before I could post 🤣
Loved the video. I really enjoy these integrate character and world building sessions
Okay I just got back from a big test and this was the BEST THING EVER!!!! Not only was the video great itself, but MORE SOLO DND CONTENT OMGOMGOMGOMGOMG
TYSM!!!!!!!!!!
First of all, this video is so smart and engaging and makes me want to be a better storyteller/writer/D&D player. But second - why is no one talking about the little sparkles when you swear? 😂 Such a cute and effective way to censor that!
When I started playing DND back in the 80’s I made the darkest backstories. It was a ten year nuclear arms race of how can I make my character the darkest character. Now I make much more wholesome backstories. I just think that’s what new players to the game do. There is nothing wrong with a dark backstory, but if you play long enough, you get over it.