Does anyone else have anxiety attacks around character creation?

[laclongquan]

I have been diagnosed with an anxiety disorder, OCD, and one thing that triggers me is character creation in RPG's. Full party creation is the absolute worst. I always want a "perfect" or optimal build and will often just try to find a guide for the "best" party build. But then I get stuck at the character creation screen for hours at a time sometimes, agonizing over my build trying to "get it right". I usually have to take some Xanax by this point.

I used to get this at character creation in Icewind Dale 1 and 2.

Well the way I deal with it is
1. PLay in small dose, from 30 to 60 minutes per session. Even in character creation, no more than that. It really sooth my anxiety not to spend more time before my nerves restore.

2. Really learn to say to myself "there's no FUCKING way to get a perfect build unless I play it myself. NO FUCKING WAY." Guides on Net? Shit. They are only good for the writers, not necessary good for you. You have to learn to trust in yourself, not in strangers. A perfect build is something you understand and play it with greatest EFFICIENCY. Like, for a position in frontline, people say a paladin mix is best, right? No, but my own play say a dual cleric fighter work better in that position. Or people say rogue is useless? Well, my own experience say rogue fighter work wonderfully and fighting way above their class level. Guides on net? SHIT.

3. so I accept that the builds may not be perfect at first. And when I learn what is perfect, well, dalekeepers and other cheat trainers are just sitting there. I dont mean to use it to cheat, but to change the characters into the perfect builds I learn.

 

[J1M]

Kingmaker has such a great character creator that I spent many hours crafting my custom party. I quit the game by the second quest because real-time with pause is garbage. Great game overall.

 

[Generic-Giant-Spider]

No. I like to take a lot of time on the character creation screen, though. I like to read through things, even if I don't intend to play them. Why, sometimes I'll sit there, eating vanilla frosted poptarts, and talking to myself about why this would suck or why that would be okay. I sound like a crazy person most times, and I get crumbs everywhere.

But that's the life of a LUSTED for bachelor, dawg.

 

[ERYFKRAD]

But that's the life of a LUSTED for bachelor,

You're only staying a bachelor because spider females kill the male sooner or later.

 

[Generic-Giant-Spider]

It's not just spider females that do it.

Hahahaha

HAHAHAHAHA

Ah

 

[ERYFKRAD]

Trap spiders don't count.

 

[TheImplodingVoice]

OP should go ask www.rpgwatch.com

 

[Paper]

I'm too lazy for this, usually just roll up something that looks decent. If I have to reroll because of that I will use a trainer, not gonna sit there to hit the reroll button over and over.

 

[theSavant]

I have similar problems when the game allows me to customize the appearance of the character (size, shape, hair, facial features etc.). I really hate this, becuase it kinda forces me to make a character who I can identify with or even resemble myself. And it becomes real work when the game allows you to customize fucking little details like eyebrow shape, eyebrow thickness, eyebrow color, eye shape, eye size, mouth shape, lip shape, lip thickness, cheek thickness, wrinkles etc. (like in Dragon Age or Oblivion). It takes an eternity to get it all right. And then when you finally start the game you find out that some small details do not fit exactly, and you could have customized "a little bit better" - forcing you to do the whole process again. Fuck this shit! It 's really annoying and stressful. It even kills the motivation and fun of playing the game. Even if the customization is optional and they have preconfigured faces, it nags me if I don't make use of the customization. Damn... I hate this shit. Don't allow me such customization, just offer some faces and I'll take the one I sympathize most.

 

[DavidBVal]

The key here is why you do that. You do it because you are infatuated with a gorgeous game with wonderful mechanics/content, or you do it always, even with shitty games with little to offer?

I feel that same compulsion in games that I adore. Wizardries, Gold Box, JA2, V:Bloodlines. I know I'll replay AoD many times as well, because I don't want to miss anything the developers put in it for me.

But if you do it for games that you later deem shitty/mediocre, and end up regretting it, then you should probably find a way out.

 

[IncendiaryDevice]

I know the feeling and too find it difficult to "just go with it", and I get anxious at the idea of "not getting everything out of a game". But exactly like octavius said, time has made it much easier to accept the unpredictable.

And it was not all bad either. Just the idea of clicking the REROLL button countless times and hearing this brings up so many wonderful memories of great fun and adventure:

TBH, in a game like BG your PC could be literally inactive as your companions could do everything anyway, so odd choice of example really.

 

[Lone Wolf]

Rolling stats/building a character? No problem. Choosing a character class when there are 8-12 options?

 

[octavius]

I have similar problems when the game allows me to customize the appearance of the character (size, shape, hair, facial features etc.). I really hate this, becuase it kinda forces me to make a character who I can identify with or even resemble myself. And it becomes real work when the game allows you to customize fucking little details like eyebrow shape, eyebrow thickness, eyebrow color, eye shape, eye size, mouth shape, lip shape, lip thickness, cheek thickness, wrinkles etc. (like in Dragon Age or Oblivion). It takes an eternity to get it all right. And then when you finally start the game you find out that some small details do not fit exactly,

...and after all the effort you end up looking like Mister Bean. Or at least I do.

 

[Baardhaas]

I wasn't willing to use Jet just to get that minor perception bonus with a high chance of addiction.

Mentats work too and addiction to those doesn't permanently fuck up your character. Starting from level 12 you could use a perk to gain one PER.

 

[flushfire]

No anxiety, but like others here I spend hours creating characters sometimes. It's just part of the fun for me I guess. If I don't feel like doing it I'll just play something else without too much customization like spider's games.

 

[KeighnMcDeath]

I have similar problems when the game allows me to customize the appearance of the character (size, shape, hair, facial features etc.). I really hate this, becuase it kinda forces me to make a character who I can identify with or even resemble myself. And it becomes real work when the game allows you to customize fucking little details like eyebrow shape, eyebrow thickness, eyebrow color, eye shape, eye size, mouth shape, lip shape, lip thickness, cheek thickness, wrinkles etc. (like in Dragon Age or Oblivion). It takes an eternity to get it all right. And then when you finally start the game you find out that some small details do not fit exactly,

...and after all the effort you end up looking like Mister Bean. Or at least I do.

Ah, reminds me when I first started not giving a shit about MMORPGS and just started going crazy. Examples:

Yes he is a leprechaun!

And boredom set in...

She told me she wanted a good clown fuck out in the open.

The KKK (Killer Klown Krew) was only horny to oblige.

I was disappointed I couldn’t get a red rubber nose

 

[gestalt11]

"Perfect is the enemy of good" -Voltaire (and various others)

Do some research, make smart decisions about where the trip ups usually occur (i.e. useless skills, DCs making things useless later,etc), decide on a general strategy, then create a best effort at that strategy. Thinking you will ever make anything perfect is just a delusion. In fact "perfect" is often a meaningless concept when there are trade offs.

Your problem is believing in a concept that does not exist and being afraid of wasting a bunch of time by making a mistake in the beginning you could not have known about and having that destroy your ability to achieve it. You will never achieve because the concept is actually silly.

Edit: this doesn't mean you can't fuck up and make a terrible character/party, you can but you will never make anything perfect. Just make something you are confident is good.

 

[King Crispy]

I'm the opposite of OP.

I have this uncanny ability to, once I've formulated a complete enough picture of the nature of the RPG I'm facing, be able to pick the exact character I want, exactly how I want him to look, and exactly how I'm going to proceed building him throughout the game.

For example, with Pathfinder: Kingmaker, I instantly knew that a pure paladin was the only choice for me. It just made sense, logically (although I will admit to having an affinity towards paladins in general). This was a game that required the main character to form his own barony, to survive and thrive in a hostile land, and there would be no room for some goofy gnomish Magus/Mystic Theurge/Monk monstrosity trying to tell people what to do. I knew I would never multiclass dip my paladin, I knew I would never deviate from pure LG choices for him, and that gave the game a singular focus and purpose that has had some interesting side-effects. Sometimes the consequences of these kinds of choices, if you abide by your original vision, can be inherently less-than-optimal, which is actually a good thing.

Now, if you were to ask me the same thing about choosing a character's name...

 

[Theldaran]

I know the feeling and too find it difficult to "just go with it", and I get anxious at the idea of "not getting everything out of a game". But exactly like octavius said, time has made it much easier to accept the unpredictable.

And it was not all bad either. Just the idea of clicking the REROLL button countless times and hearing this brings up so many wonderful memories of great fun and adventure:

TBH, in a game like BG your PC could be literally inactive as your companions could do everything anyway, so odd choice of example really.

Charname could also be the best character in a given combination so he's quite right.

 

[theSavant]

That choosing character names has also bugged me in my latest Wiz8 playthrough. Fortunately the game allows you to change name, portrait and voice at any time during the game. This really helped to get started.

 

[The Glitterdust Golem]

I have played games for hundreds of hours without my brain ever leaving the character creation stage (even if I have in effect played the actual game for a while, I'm considering nothing but how I can go back, rebuild, and get the party I need.)

Playing games that give you NPC party members, but allow full party customization? Those are the absolute worst. I want the story-beats, and yet, I want the efficiency of my own custom-made party - especially when the NPCs are almost never, ever sufficient enough to support the type of play-styles I prefer. Pathfinder Kingdoms, cough-cough.

 

[Dorateen]

Life is bliss when all you want to do is recreate your beloved pen and paper characters (or reasonable facsimiles) in a digital environment.

 

[Alpan]

I don't have anxiety attacks, but I feel similarly about actually starting a new game. I'm dealing with a lot of stuff IRL and feel like I constantly have to weigh the pros and cons of starting a new game vs doing something else with that time. It's called opportunity cost and ironically it leads to a lot of wasted time.

 

[KeighnMcDeath]

Starting to wish I could just make hundreds or thousands of alts on various GAMES then sell them for some real $$$. Bah, no one buys that shit.

 

[Werdna's Revenge]

This is why we need more Traveler style character creation systems. Take the absolute control out of the hands of all the crazy faggots in this thread and force them to live with what the RNG gives them (or at least make things so stupidly tedious they'll give up.)