I’m asking because the question the other day about silliest characters had a lot of funny comments.
Personally, I like to play as characters who are perpetually on the brink of fucking things up. Other players adore this, their PCs don’t.
As an example, a week ago, the party was being escorted by a noble to a fort, although the noble was lagging behind. My character (who was a kobold gremlin) announced her presence and demanded to be let in. The guard manning the gate asked how he could be sure that we hadn’t killed or kidnapped the noble. My kobold said “Isn’t the whole point of kidnapping to announce it and use it as leverage? Why would we be hiding it from you?” The party’s ‘dad’ quickly interjected that we had not kidnapped the noble, and that they were just around the bend. My kobold insisted to be let in, arguing “Just let us in, and if you need to arrest us for killing the noble, you’ll have us surrounded.” The party dad stared daggers at my character, and asked if she was deliberately trying to fuck things up. (the answer was yes, she had been slighted by the dad who did not let her be a gremlin) The dad asked the games to ignore everything my character had said, and the DM asked us to both do persuasion rolls. The other player rolled a nat one, and I rolled a nat 20. We both said “fuck.” At the same time, and he burst out laughing.
I’ve played a devious, scheming, money-hungry rogue. I’ve played an aloof know-it-all wizard. I’ve played a hippie-dippy can’t-we-all-just-get-along bard. I’ve played a killjoy by-the-book paladin. I’ve played a 60 IQ barbarian. I’ve played a problematically-curious artificer. I’ve played a brooding warlock.
To me, the whole point is to play different characters differently. I tend to swing pretty far from one campaign to the next.
Hard question, because different characters fit well with different groups.
Some groups appreciate the very flawed characters and chaos gremlins who will throw a spanner into the works when everyone is least expecting it; some get frustrated by that. Some like edgy, anti-social, or anti-authority characters who chafe at any kind of order or social organization. Some groups just want the very different, but ultimately compatible characters who become fire-forged friends along the way and get annoyed by deeper intracharacter incompatibilities.
It also depends on where you fall on the conflict <-> cooperation scale. I’ve played a sociopathic necromancer who looked down on all the other PCs, but stuck along with the party because he had good reason to. I was careful to never actually obstruct other players’ goals or actions, but there was plenty of acerbic banter and sneaking around to be had.
