Shattered Kingdoms

I come from a mud where stats are (more or less) static, and I'm having a few questions regarding how to roleplay dynamic stats.

Do you roleplay your stats at a particular point in time? As in, do you change your emotes, movements etc. to fit a rising dexterity? Do you roleplay getting wiser/more intelligent with time?

The reason I ask is I play a rather unattractive girl, and but I've been advised to max out charisma. I understand from the helpfile here that charisma shouldn't be understood as appearance per se, but rather social skills in a broader context, but it would still be a very different girl than the barely-sociable one I started out with. Then again, all you with "handsome/gorgeous/stunning/beautiful/elegant" as adjectives - did you pick your adjective later, or did you start out with a high charisma, or do you not equate the two?

My question is should I adapt my roleplay to changing stats? If she's acrobatic and influential, is it considered bad roleplay to play an awkward, shy and selfconscious girl who looks a bit like a drowned mouse?

In my personal opinion, if the RP fits the attributes of the character then the player is showing very good roleplay skills.

There are some folks however that roll for example giants that have huge CON and STR yet seem to grasp all the nuances of magecraft and protections as if they were tutored by grandmaster sorcerors every other day of their childhood... it comes down to gameplay versus roleplay, from what I've seen.

Being unable to lift an object (STR attribute) is a fairly direct roleplay-attribute link... however the help file for attributes like charisma deliberately provide leeway: an unattractive woman need not be a social outcast, since personality and other traits may make them charismatic (despite their looks?) - or perhaps they just cake on the foundation and wear mesh leather pants.

In summary, if you chose to RP against your stats I don't think anyone would really punish you harshly. You may get some advice from time to time if there is no way in hell that your character would act the way he/she does, but most 'moments' of unexpected behaviour might be explained. Possible excuses could be a savante's clarity, intuition, 'dumb luck', rote learning, unreasonable fear from a childhood experience, and so on. Imagination and roleplay always go hand in hand.

Warning: roleplaying against alignment is not nearly so 'flexible' - you run the very real risk of being demoted levels or deleted if you decide to 'act diabolic' when your character is principled, or vice versa.

I have actually been advised at once to not pay too close attention class and alignment help files.

When it comes to roleplaying, there are two sides: your actions and other people's perceptions.

There is a character in game whose description shows him being disfigured, and yet, he is by far one of the most charistmatic people. I always love being around him.

Your character may decide to hold back or hide certain attributes. Such as she may be very charismatic, but due to feeling like a social outcast, she rarely has much to say.

Charisma is merely how easily you speak and work the crowds. Hitler (ack!) was a great example of how fugly and bad message are ignored when one knows how to speak to people.

But the flip side is perception, how people will perceive you. If you play a giant, they expect you to be dumb. If you play a barbarian, they expect you to be dumb. You play a paladin, they are looking for the stick that is stuck up your... You get the point.

The best thing I can recommend is this: Treat your character as a person. Her stats will play into who she is, but her/his current lifetime experiences will affect how they act. Allow the experiences they have to change or strengthen their views. Give them a personality and a life. Others will try to 'suggest' how your character should act, but this is your little life form, you treat it how you think it should act (obviously, as noted, keeping it within the alignment restrictions as Zynor said).

Good luck with your character and remember, she is yours and supposed to be fun!!!!

Well, it is interesting, cause I had this discussion with a friend the other day. Although I believe that the character's alignment is something to be VERY STRICTLY followed (and I get pissed off to see too often lighties playing like diabolical, or diabolical chars being to helpful and kind), I think there is a wide area of free choice around the attributes of your character. And that is because, although the atts may show what your character REALLY is, there is the RP of your character, regarding what HE/SHE feels he/she is, or how other people around the character make him/her feel.

I.E: A giant may be Naive, regarding his wisdom, but if he thinks that he is old enough to be wise or wiser than all of his kin, he shall try to act wise, and maybe he may even have brilliancies in moments. A sprite can't be too strong, yet, you may often see a sprite flex his muscles in pride, as he takes a foe down. A character with small charisma, may be surrounded by a bunch of people who THINK he is charismatic and listen to all he/she has to say.

To sum up, it is more to what your character THINKS about self, or the others around make him/her feel like, rather than his/her true stats, IMHO.

I have recently run into this dilemma myself... basically, I've noticed the way I play my character shifting as she gets older and more experienced and her personality changes, so there have been moments for a couple of months where I advance a level and think "hmm... as a warrior it would really be useful to finish maxing out my STR and get it over with, but can I really keep playing her as though she's getting cannier and more influential without sinking a point into WIS or CHA every now and then?"

No question in my mind at all. I can't. In the example above, the point's getting spent on WIS/CHA, regardless of how much easier doing otherwise would make my life in terms of Pure Game Mechanics. I just can't in good conscience be that much of a twink.

No offense to anyone who chooses otherwise [at least in minor ways], this is just the way I see it.
But unless you're doing it for [tragi]comic value, I'm still gonna have a hard time respecting your right to play your INT 5, CHA 6 merc as a suave young aristocrat who smokes a pipe and loves to regale his buddies with scholarly lore, just so you can sink more points into STR, CON, DEX, HP, instead.

You'll never know what another character's stat pts have been put into specifically unless they tell you oocly anyway, so why worry about it?

Ive never considered CHA to have much affect on the way I RP, but I do take notice of it and usually put somthing in the description, or perhaps the adjective itself that shows how ugly my character is.
So its not my fault if everyone actually listens to the opinion of a fugly warrior who drools the whole time hes talking.

As for INT or WIS I usually do RP it to a certain degree, but in cases such as age an elder giant would know more about the world than a bright young half-elf, now how the giant goes about showing that knowledge is where the RP would come into effect.

And if your character doesnt want to be dumb forever, just get a few INT stat mods, its not hard to get a Dim character all the way to Brilliant, believe me Ive done it on many occasions.... of course it does suck when you die and return to life dumb as a rock.

It depends. I do believe that one's attributes should affect one's roleplay, as well as spells that strongly affect attributes, like feeblemind. At the same time, it's awfully hard to deal with the huge increase of stats that a young adventurer goes through.

IMO, that Amateur sorceror who hasn't mechanically maxed his intelligence yet isn't of sub-genius intelligence, he just hasn't learned to focus his mind. Thinking of a young adventurer's low stats as a lack of skill and practice can be helpful.

I'd also note that playing against one's stats can be justified, if you look at increases as focused skills. An antisocial scout may invest in higher charisma, reflecting his increasing ability to work with animals. That doesn't necessarily mean he gets along with humans better, though!