Ask a player to show you their character and they will hand you a character sheet. Ask your player to describe their character, and they will tell you the same thing the character sheet says, perhaps in interpreted words, maybe with a picture or a small but of disjointed history. This static view of the character is really contradictory in every sense of playing a character, since so much of the story in an RPG is the growth of a character.
I've tried to do something like this before with Pathfinder. The problem with Pathfinder is that there is a lot going on in the rules and it is hard to capture everything in a short form. It could be done in software, but I've never found any software that did it. Even working through a progression to meet the simple requirements for a prestige class can take a lot of work in Pathfinder. Planning over levels is hard Trying to capture the full progression of a character in both stats and personal growth is unmanageable.
With the introduction of such a streamlined ruleset in D&D 5e, it is now very feasible to capture a character as a path of growth rather than just a snapshot of state. I am including an example below for my 5th level Eldritch Knight Llarm. In this graphic, I describe my level 1 character. Then at each level up, I describe why Llarm is growing in the direction he is. In some cases this is just the nature of the character. In other cases, this is driven by events happening in game. Together these elements show both the states of Llarm and the growth of Llarm throughout the game.
I've tried to do something like this before with Pathfinder. The problem with Pathfinder is that there is a lot going on in the rules and it is hard to capture everything in a short form. It could be done in software, but I've never found any software that did it. Even working through a progression to meet the simple requirements for a prestige class can take a lot of work in Pathfinder. Planning over levels is hard Trying to capture the full progression of a character in both stats and personal growth is unmanageable.
With the introduction of such a streamlined ruleset in D&D 5e, it is now very feasible to capture a character as a path of growth rather than just a snapshot of state. I am including an example below for my 5th level Eldritch Knight Llarm. In this graphic, I describe my level 1 character. Then at each level up, I describe why Llarm is growing in the direction he is. In some cases this is just the nature of the character. In other cases, this is driven by events happening in game. Together these elements show both the states of Llarm and the growth of Llarm throughout the game.
The Growth of Llarm
From this diagram I can see how Llarm's background and the choice of Eldritch Knight fit together. I can see why he takes damage spells as cantrips and utility spells as level 1 spells. I can see how war caster, shield, and second attack all feed a growing obsession that Llarm has with protecting his party (now his friends) by charging in head first as a meat shield. I can also see that in the future Llarm may want to take more social skills as a feat, because he wants to learn to lie better. I can also see how his curiosity and arcane background mesh in his new goal of finding out how to become immortal.
From a purely statistical point of view, I can see that Llarm is using a shield and a rapier because of his high dex, and he is focusing on using warcaster with the arcane touch cantrips for melee. Firebolt and his crossbow also give him ranged options. This fits will a desire to due good damage but maintain some flexibility. Shield also should give him a very high AC with light armor and a shield as a reaction, giving him a lot more confidence when going into melee with a big bad.
Most interestingly is that I could share this as a character with another person and they would be able to build Llarm at all levels up to 5. I have not only given them a snapshot of the character, but the whole character.
I hope that as software builders are looking at the next generation of character builders, that they give us this type of view and interface. I think being able to plan and share the growth of a character over levels is far more useful that just being able to share a snapshot. Maybe even, someone could even build an RPG with this in mind from the start.
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