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[Jimmy]

Yep, what's most important is to strike a balance between playing the game and playing your character.

Imagine yourself as your character. You're most at home on a battlefield soaked in sweat and blood, but for some reason you're stuck at a nobleman's party. This really isn't your thing, but you're an adult and you're going to see it out as best you can without bringing shame on yourself and your friends.

I'm sure pretty much everyone can relate to feeling lost and awkward at a party, so act that way. Say your character starts looking around for someone he thinks might relate with him. Or say he looks for a pretty girl he thinks he might be able to impress with his tales of battle. Or say that he slips outside and tries to bum a smoke off one of the waiters. He doesn't need to necessarily be the life of the party, because that's not the kind of person he is. What he does do is feel and act awkwardly, but he might just luck out and have a good time anyway.

[kilakan]

Incidentally the degree of rolling in games tends to vary wildly from gm to gm. In my games, diplomacy can usually be done by actually talking and bargaining with the person, while Intimidate usually requires a roll. Some GMs strictly use diplo, bluff and intimidate rolls all the time, and others never.

I tend to have people roll for everything you technically should according to the rolls. (cha skills, ect ect) but then change the DC they need to hit in accordance with what they are actually doing/saying.  Of course, that leaves room for crit failures which is indicative of real life anyways, since a lot of people will occasionally stumble right over what they are trying to say despite what they intended to say.

[Jimmy]

At our table, players never get to roll Diplomacy, Intimidate, Bluff or Sense Motive against another player. NPCs are fair game, but unless it would affect the outcome of something I usually don't bother. Knowledge checks, on the other hand, are typically expected, as well as the occasional ability check to avoid your character doing something stupid like destroying their bag of holding by putting something sharp inside it, even though you just said you put all the weapons from the last fight into your bag.

[Neonivek]

Rangers have to rely on their pet and spells to make up the difference... I'd include favored enemy but Fighters get the equivalent of favored enemy bonus on all enemies all the time.

Then again I have no idea why people keep insisting that Rangers are better than Fighters at two weapon fighting OR Ranged fighting when Fighters just flat out shut them down. Ignoring that fighters eventually get more feats... they also have access to Fighter feats that are leagues better.

Because unlike Fighter feats, Ranger bonus feats allow you to ignore prerequisites, so you can go pure-strength and still get all Two-Weapon Fighting feats. Much less useful once Dex-to-Damage became a thing, though.

And Favoured Enemy Bonus is much stronger than Weapon Training in Pathfinder. It gets up to 10 to-hit and damage at cap.

Edit: Whoops. Did not mean to double-post. Thought I hit Modify, not New Post.

Ahh but that is the catch! The fighter actually benefits from the split because of their armor training!

[Kadzar]

This is why I like 5e's backgrounds, as they allow you to pick up skills you wouldn't ordinarily get with your class, which is how I ended up playing a merchant barbarian. Theoretically you could do something similar in 3e/PF by giving free class skills, though fighters and other martial classes have such anemic skill points that you'd have to do a bit of adjusting to make it work.

Frankly, I don't like it when games make you choose between being good at fighting and having any sort of social skills. Unless someone is low-functioning autistic or has never met another sentient being, they're going to have some sort of social skills.

I suppose the situation can be somewhat alleviated by treating Diplomacy as just something to roll to persuade people to do things they wouldn't normally do, and you can otherwise talk to them and ask them to do things they'd normally want to do anyways without any rolls. Then people who invest in the skill still get something, while people who don't don't have to be silent during social encounters for fear of rolling poorly and doing something stupid in-game. Acting like a buffoon should be a roleplaying choice, not something you should have to do because you picked a certain class (unless it's a bard).

[NullForceOmega]

Incidentally the degree of rolling in games tends to vary wildly from gm to gm. In my games, diplomacy can usually be done by actually talking and bargaining with the person, while Intimidate usually requires a roll. Some GMs strictly use diplo, bluff and intimidate rolls all the time, and others never.

I tend to have people roll for everything you technically should according to the rolls. (cha skills, ect ect) but then change the DC they need to hit in accordance with what they are actually doing/saying.  Of course, that leaves room for crit failures which is indicative of real life anyways, since a lot of people will occasionally stumble right over what they are trying to say despite what they intended to say.

This right here is the optimal strategy for good roleplaying.  The dice are just a random element, there to keep things somewhat arbitrary, they aren't the god of the table, the DM/GM is.

[Harry Baldman]

This is why I like 5e's backgrounds, as they allow you to pick up skills you wouldn't ordinarily get with your class, which is how I ended up playing a merchant barbarian. Theoretically you could do something similar in 3e/PF by giving free class skills, though fighters and other martial classes have such anemic skill points that you'd have to do a bit of adjusting to make it work.

A lot of traits in Pathfinder do that as well, giving you a class skill and a bonus to using it. I think pretty much every common skill has at least one trait that gives it, and Pathfinder also gives you the option to take an extra skill point every level in your favored class.

I also played a half-orc merchant barbarian in 5E once, actually. Was fun!

[Sirus]

There are so many traits in Pathfinder, you can easily build characters with skills and abilities they might never possess otherwise, or buffed versions of their existing powers. It's actually really cool (unless you hate that sort of thing I guess).

[Neonivek]

5th edition is unfortunately a diamond in the rough having so many great ideas that would immediately make it one of the best dungeons and dragons to date...

But while it is the most balanced it is also overbalanced... removing what is essentially character creation to retain balance.

[Harry Baldman]

There are so many traits in Pathfinder, you can easily build characters with skills and abilities they might never possess otherwise, or buffed versions of their existing powers. It's actually really cool (unless you hate that sort of thing I guess).

Best of all, the GM can allow as many traits as they want (such as 4 or so instead of the regular 2) if they'd like something as powerful as 5E's backgrounds.

[Neonivek]

There are so many traits in Pathfinder, you can easily build characters with skills and abilities they might never possess otherwise, or buffed versions of their existing powers. It's actually really cool (unless you hate that sort of thing I guess).

Best of all, the GM can allow as many traits as they want (such as 4 or so instead of the regular 2) if they'd like something as powerful as 5E's backgrounds.

Not... exactly... though I'd get into it but then I'd have to talk about campaign specific traits.

[My Name is Immaterial]

What the fuck

No seriously

What the actual fuck

[Neonivek]

What the fuck

No seriously

What the actual fuck

Jack Chick made a comic that basically was a fable against the EVILS of Dungeons and Dragons

The people who made the movie basically made a parody by playing the original comic perfectly straight.

If you want to see someone riffing on this movie (Jontron in this case) then here you go:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=subQrEPKytA

But honestly watch this movie.

[My Name is Immaterial]

No, no, I get that part, but... why.
Is this supposed to be a parody
I don't get it anymore
I don't get anything anymore

[Neonivek]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mTa9DfOnltA

This is a parody

They achieve this parody by displaying people's prejudices and hatred towards homosexuals and playing it straight so you can see just how ridiculous is.

Dark Dungeons works the same way. It plays Jack Chick's work as if it was the bible.