RP'ing a 'Hero class'

While on my last jaunt at sea i had some hours of boredom on my hands, so inevitably my thoughts turned to women, alcahol and even occasionally WoW.

one such thought that passed through my head was regarding The perception and view of the community on people RP'ing 'hero classes', examples of these could be as such...

Blademaster
Necromancer
Lich
Demon hunter
Mountain king
Gunman (look it up).
Spell breakers

These are just a few examples of a set of classess/Roleplay types a character can fall into. my own opinion at present is somewhat shaded and un-specific, i've seen people do well RP'ing as one while others fail miserably at it, as well as seeing some classess from Warcrafts deeper lore and WC3 be impossible to RP, or simply not tried. right now? i'd say its down to the individual and their lore knowledge.

Whats your thoughts?

I say go for it. RP allows us to be beyond the standard class in meaning and function, and TotalRolePlay is a great plugin to provide support for such things.

Delidah for example, reads as a "Elf Trickster" instead of a "Night Elf Mage" because I feel it reflects her personality much better then the default.

I think one of the most important factors to pulling it off successfully is recognizing when a particular "hero class" concept is expected to be too rare for a player character to come out of nowhere as a full-fledged member.

It doesn't mean that it can't be done. It just requires that the player can pull it off in such a way that others will find it believable. I'd compare it to player characters in positions of official authority. It's hard to accept them when the character just appear in that position out of nowhere, but it becomes much easier if the character starts out small and works it way into it through actual roleplay, letting everyone else both observe and influence the process.

I agree with Saevir here.

I know that it can be done. And it can be done extremely well. Just that one has to be careful with how one does it.
Coming out and just saying "I'm a fully fledged master demon hunter" from no where is generally a bad idea. Much better would be comming out and slowly letting that fact come into the circle.
You were a demon hunter all along, but didn't flag with it for "SPECHUL!"

A great example of doing it good would be Krogon's Blade Mastering.
At first I... really didn't like it. Sitting here on my fat arse as Marogg being grumpy. But seeing how it was pulled off, I had nothing but respect for the thought put into it with trinkets, potions, and cleverly used game mechanics.
So impressed that I actually did go through trainig with a character on my own even!

So, my point here is that if one is to come out of "no where" as a hero class. They have to be smart about it. And present it in a clever way.
You can't just come with Warglaves of Azinoth and the blind fold and be "Demon Hunter hoooo!" But rather you should look at the class and make it personal while true.
For example, who is to say that all demon hunters would use glaives as weapons?

But, I don't want to start rabling, and I hope I got some points of my thoughts on the matter across.

Personally, the way I'd get around it is build a character that was training at some point or strives to become a hero class. That way you can get all the benefits without the OP side of it shooting through. This is just my personal opinion on it though.

E.G, In MoP, I plan to make a Human Monk who admires the Demon Hunters to the point where he blinded himself and strives to learn their craft.

See, that's where you go wrong. For a Night Elf, the lore is there. There's even blindfolded character models. Now you feel the need to push even further, by making a speshul human that wants to be a demon hunter.

The humans have paladins for that, and on our server, the Chapters witch hunters. If you want to be a Demon Hunter, for god sake, roll a Night Elf >_>

Delidah wrote:If you want to be a Demon Hunter, for god sake, roll a Night Elf >_>

Or a Blood Elf - Illidari.

No, you're completing getting the idea of role-playing as a 2D aspect. I'm in no way BEING a Demon Hunter, I'm striving to be LIKE one and train like one.

I've had this discussion with a different context before, but I could role-play a man who wants to be a bear if I want to. Give me any lore reference that says that is going against the lore..

Paladins and Demon-Hunters are NOT similar.

They are similar in the fact that they are there specifically to combat evil. Demon Hunters are an elven cultural expression of that, as paladins are human. Your "human" would have to be pretty thick in elven culture to even get the idea to want to become a demon hunter. The two societies arn't exactly well-integrated...

Then again. That can be done. My main character is as lorelol as they get ^^

After the events of the last few expansions, I'm sure the Stormwind library would have plenty of knowledge on Demon-Hunters and Night Elf culture. I'd base it around a character who studied excessively but blinded himself in a twisted jealousy to become something he knew he could not.

The best characters are the unpredictable ones.

Vaell wrote:The best characters are the unpredictable ones.

/Agree

Misanthropy wrote:

Delidah wrote:If you want to be a Demon Hunter, for god sake, roll a Night Elf >_>

Or a Blood Elf - Illidari.

If you manage to pull of a Survivor of the Attack on the Black Temple. And that for some reason you are not following your old master... Being that with Illy gone you have no leader. Or well, you could role play a outcast if you go for Blood Elf, enemy to the horde and alliance.... To join the Horde back would be kinda hard.

And on topic on hand... I believe that only a Lich would be hard to pull off. The rest can be done, even if many will frown upon it.. But if they see how good you are then they will change their minds
More over, some of them are supposed by lore to live in solitude, maybe come from time to time to places with more people but not that often. Or only when something big is happening.. For a example a Demon Hunter will come if a greater demon was released somewhere. And he will stay as long as it is needed to stop the Demon, then leave Society once more.

Misanthropy wrote:

Vaell wrote:The best characters are the unpredictable ones.

/Agree

Completely disagree. Best characters are well-rounded ones, with clear goals, ambitions and obstacles.

A characters actions should always somehow make sense when keeping those things in mind. Saying an unpredictable character is best almost seems like saying a poorly thought out character is the best.

Delidah wrote:

Misanthropy wrote:

Vaell wrote:The best characters are the unpredictable ones.

/Agree

Completely disagree. Best characters are well-rounded ones, with clear goals, ambitions and obstacles.

A characters actions should always somehow make sense when keeping those things in mind. Saying an unpredictable character is best almost seems like saying a poorly thought out character is the best.

Unpredictable as in the rest doesnt know these goals and hence the actions make little sense to the rest and can be seen as unpredictable.

But if a well thought out character is written to be unpredictable and often does the wrong/right thing in the wrong/right situation it can lead to good quality roleplaying experiences so long as when you say unpredictable you don't mean "running into cathedral sqr. and attacking the pope" unpredictable.
For example; a goblin with faulty gadgets who will /roll to decide between possible outcomes.

Delidah has point. While breaking stereotypes can be interesting, it only works when there's a well-founded and believable reason that for it being broken. This is doubly important for racial stereotypes where the question isn't just "why X?", but "why X instead of Y?".

The more complex and reliant on rare or unique circumstances that the explanation becomes, the more likely it is for the average player to question it out of pure instinct, regardless of how well thought-out and logical the actual process is. It's the exact same reason that incorporating stereotypes work so well. They are usually the outcome of simple and natural circumstances that are readily believable.

Edit: I am slow, so the discussion is way past this point by now apparently

Poorly thought out and unpredictability are utterly different. Of course they won't be unpredictable to the person writing/playing the character. Every single character I create I've stitched together a plausible story with loads of past stories set aside in my head, along with origins. Out of all my characters, not one has let their clear goals or intentions known to others because giving away too much so fast is boring and makes a dull character. I'd say I'm pretty good at creating characters, I don't just throw myself in the deep end and hope there is a catch I can use to make a character acceptable, I do my research.

Anyway, back on topic. Morgaan said it best; the Lich is the only one out of that list which would cause issues IMO.
You missed out Far Seer, Dark Ranger and Beastmaster though! (And a few others but these 3 are awesome)

Tbh, Paladins and Death Knights are hero classes - so I don't see a big issue.

Considering I play both an Archmage and Necromancer, I obviously consider this a non-issue. There is no reason we should be limited to just what we have available in-game, as long as we have the tools to adequately play our 'desired' class.

Really, I'm pretty lenient as far as people playing stuff not available in-game. All I ask is that they do it well. Death Knights, an in-game class, are more difficult to play right than most of the classes on that list, and sadly few people do. The fact they are a main class does not make them somehow easier, or less powerful.

Speaking of power, there is nothing wrong with playing a powerful character. Again, you just need to play it well. That means, not abusing it on a whim, and having various counters that people can exploit to get around it. In my example, again, Drustai is an archmage. She's had such a dedication (and addiction) to magic over the last 26 thousand years that it wouldn't make sense for her to not be one. I counter this by making her A) untalented, her 'raw power' is no better than anyone else's, and B ) a scholar, not a battlemage, so in a fight she's usually easy to defeat unless she's been given the opportunity to plan out and prepare for it. Ultimately, she's an archmage by virtue of knowledge, not raw power. This leaves her being powerful, but not overpowering.

Hmm Far seer is some kind of Shaman am i right? And Beast master would just be a name for a Hunter good with all animals. And well Darkranger might be hard to play. You need a dead Blood Elf ( Don't you dare mention Death Knight!) Tho i would love to see a Spell Breaker. It would be mostly a Blood Elf, but there is no reason a High Elf survivor would be one aswell.

Morgaan wrote:Hmm Far seer is some kind of Shaman am i right? And Beast master would just be a name for a Hunter good with all animals. And well Darkranger might be hard to play. You need a dead Blood Elf ( Don't you dare mention Death Knight!) Tho i would love to see a Spell Breaker. It would be mostly a Blood Elf, but there is no reason a High Elf survivor would be one aswell.

Yeah a Far seer is to a shaman like a Blademaster is to a warrior. Advanced and more adept. Yeah, you're right in a sense with BM, but it is more of a way of life than just to be good with animals. For Dark Ranger, go pale skin BElf hunter with the Dark Ranger gear (spend time to collect it) and you could pull it off.

Morgaan wrote:go pale skin BElf hunter with the Dark Ranger gear (spend time to collect it) and you could pull it off.

And be awesome while doing it.

Vaell wrote:Dark Ranger gear (spend time to collect it)

Though I very much doubt it will be mail I would very much appreciate a link?

Misanthropy wrote:

Vaell wrote:Dark Ranger gear (spend time to collect it)

Though I very much doubt it will be mail I would very much appreciate a link?

Yeah, only part of it is unfortunately.
http://wowroleplaygear.com/2011/09/09/dark-ranger-i/

Or, you know, compose a set yourself, spent some time finding the right pieces. Get addons like atlasLoot or MogIt

you can go for other shoulderpads tough and go as a rogue.