pluralpcs

[pluralpcs]

Hey do you know if there's anywhere to find TTRPG sessions with other plural systems, specifically ones who want multiple headmates to be able to make characters? Like, the game has one or two systems playing, but the systems have characters for all of their co-fronting headmates, so they can all play together?

Hi! Holy crap I'm sorry we didn't see this until now!

Unfortunately we don't know of any LFG places that are plural focused. You might have luck just asking about that in general ttrpg spaces or ones for the games you play specifically. Depending on the community, they'll of course be more or less accepting. We mainly play Pathfinder 2e, and have found the community on discord pretty friendly.

You could also try asking around in plural groups like r/plurals.

We haven't tried that ourselves, but we didn't want to leave you with just a shrug.

Best of luck to y'all!! We hope you find the group you're looking for!

(And of course, for anyone seeing this, feel free to use this post to find other players!)

-Faye

[pluralpcs]

[Silly] Faye is now doing this, much to all of our chagrin...

(Whoops! Wrong blog 😆 😆 😆)

Bundun & Dunbun from shorts wars are a system... kind of...?

Is this a headcanon or are they presented that way?

I know nothing about this and looking it up leaves me more confused. What I read seems to suggest Dunbun is a clone, but I really just don't understand any of it.

[pluralpcs]

You know, it comes to mind how often anti-endogenic rhetoric includes the phrases ‘faking’ or ‘roleplaying’ being a system.

But could you imagine? A world where tabletop players played plural characters more often? Where people studied and looked into people’s lived experiences as systems to get ideas for how to play such characters respectfully, and how such things might interact with the game?

Hell, a number of existing ttrpgs support such ideas, in theory if not explicitly. D&D 5E includes characters capable of changing forms and pretending to be others on a regular basis, who’s to say they aren’t just letting someone else front? Maybe a Warlock is so tightly bound to their patron that they effectively become a system, or part of one? What about Echo Knight Fighters allowing headmates to dictate the actions of their echoes?

Another ttrpg that has a ton of potential for plural characters is Lancer. The character themself can be just about anyone, since most of the rules are about piloting mechs, and there’s a Talent feature for those who connect their minds to complex AI systems called NHPs and blur the lines between the two. That’s explicitly plural stuff, especially since pilots can give temporary control of their mechs to these same NHPs, effectively Switching in context of this post.

All I’m really saying is, if endogenic systems really ARE just roleplaying, and they’re not, at least that spreads awareness of systems and gives people opportunities to expand their horizons more. There are ways to connect systemhood to your life in manners that enrich it. Seek them out.

[pluralpcs]

YOOOO YOU KNOW THAT PIDCAST WE'VE BEEN OBSESSING OVER???

WE FUCKING CALLED IT.

HART IS PLURAL! WE JUST DIDN'T EXPECT IT TO BE WITH MAVE. :D

https://pca.st/episode/09f7b9f0-30c8-47bf-ac7b-16885704114f?t=2159

Awesome!!

[pluralpcs]

What if the GM played alters besides the host as NPCs? Or anyone who’s active at the same time as the “main” character for some reason, like if the scene is taken in to headspace?

We personally are very hesitant to do that.

Now, plenty of games that have plurality in them will go with this approach. Usually it's some sort of possession, where the ghost, spirit, alien, whatever, is an NPC under the GM's control. And usually there's systems in place that dictate a switch. So it's certainly not outlandish whatsoever to have different headmates than the host be played and controlled by the GM.

And this approach certainly makes a lot of sense. Headmates don't always get along. When they don't it can lead to some extreme situations. Injecting that kind of drama from the GM might be perfect for a game.

Some pitfalls to avoid however are more specific variations of the same kinds of pitfalls GMs need to be aware of anyways. For most games, it's pretty risky to impose things on the player's character's backstory. For instance, it might make for an awesome game to reveal that the BBEG turns out to be the PC's parent. But it also might be pretty frustrating for the player if this contradicts the backstory they had already established.

So if a player had an idea for a plural character, handing over one, or nearly all, headmates to the GM to control opens up a lot of risk that the GM will play said headmates in ways that contradict what the player intends. And unlike someone in their backstory, their character's headmates will be sticking around.

If the GM springs a headmate on a PC, that's likely to cause some friction. If the GM doesn't give the PC options to avoid a switch, that's going to feel like a lot of autonomy taken away from them. Yes, all of these things can and do happen to real life systems, but in the context of a game we have to consider what is fun more. And if the player of this plural PC is also plural, all of these intra-system conflicts might hit a little too close to home.

Ultimately though, these issues are something that's handled with lots of communication, making sure to get consent, and providing the player with autonomy appropriate to the game being run. Having an ongoing dialogue between the player and the GM about expectations is always important, but more so when the GM is taking such an active role in a PC's simple existence.

Now, our more personal gripe definitely might not match up with others. But for us, and our system, there's a certain level of closeness that's really hard to emulate between people who don't share a body. I can give my headmates a thought that takes a ton of work to put into words. I can literally feel the emotions in my headmates' words. A headmate can share with me their literal thoughts on the matter leaving no room for ambiguity in what they mean. To try and replicate that requires so much talk at the table, and it can still fall short simply because the GM or we misunderstood each other. Which is not a universal experience for systems, though, but it might be something to keep in mind.

[pluralpcs]

Could you help people come up with how to mechanically play switching or co-fronting? Stuff that would require homebrew? Also can we dm to share plural character ideas?

We would love to help!

Obviously homebrew is going to be different for every game system, (and of course every table at that) though. So general ideas on how to homebrew something are a bit out of our wheel house. We are absolutely open to helping brainstorm anything more specific though (e.g. for a given D&D class, or like an action in Pathfinder 2e, or moves in PBtA).

We do plan on working on some system hacks for FATE at some point though!

And yes, we would love to hear about plural character ideas. We would be happy to share them here as well if you're comfortable with that!

[pluralpcs]

Plural Warlocks

Warlocks have got to be our favorite class. Since 3.5e we've absolutely loved playing them. Hell, even the character that was explicitly plural (before we realized we were plural ourselves) in a 4th edition game ended up going warlock. At the time of writing this, two of our headmates are playing a Hexblade Warlock; one plays the human that started with their now shared body, the other plays a sentient high tech sword that takes over from time to time.

So, here are some ways to use warlock to make a plural character!

Base Class Features

Pact Magic: We'll get into how spells can be used to code your character as plural, as well as specific spells that stand out as plural coded already, or that can be reflavored easily. That will all be in its own section below. However Pact Magic is a unique form of spellcasting in 5e that we find especially works for plural characters. Why is your warlock able to refresh their spell slots with an hour of rest? Well it's because each headmate has their own spell slots. It just takes about an hour to switch, or it takes an hour to prepare their spells when they first start fronting.

Otherworldly Patron: Like with spells, we'll cover this in it's own section below. But suffice to say, this class feature can easily be plural coded. At the very least, your plural warlock could share their body with their patron; whether that be the patron itself, a member of the patron's class, category, or organization, or an emissary sent by the patron. We will discuss more specific mechanics that each subclass offers below.

Eldritch Invocation: A lot of these invocations can be used to represent specific headmates doing things (e.g. Beast Speech being used by animal headmates). But here are some specific ones we thought really stood out:

Eldritch Mind: A headmate concentrates on the spell, making it easier for the system to hold onto it.

Gaze of Two Minds: A headmate jumps into someone else's head and reports back to the rest of the system.

Mask of Many Faces: Yup. Probably a dream of most every plural system out there. Cast this whenever your character switches.

Master of Myriad Forms: Second verse, same as the first.

Minions of Chaos: Summoning spells/abilities can be flavored to be less of a summoning an extraplanar creature but rather allowing a headmate to physically manifest themselves.

Misty Visions: With magic, imposition can be a lot cooler!

Voice of the Chain Master: This one feels very plural adjacent. Perhaps one of your character's headmates' can inhabit the familiar.

Whispers of the Grave: This is basically doing mediumship.

Pact Boon: Pact of the Chain works well if you also have Voice of the Chain Master mentioned above. Pact of the Talisman might be used to represent a headmate that inhabits an object (also good for a POSIC character). Said headmate offers assistance, guidance, or moral support. Some of the invocations for the talisman might expand this out (such as having the headmate reach out and slap someone that hits their wearer).

Mystic Arcanum: Like with the spellcasting feature, different headmates can be the ones to cast different spells. Maybe one specific headmate is an archmage, so they're the only one who can access the higher level spells from Mystic Arcanum, and that's why they don't refresh during a short rest.

Eldritch Master: If you've been doing the "switching takes an hour and everyone has their own spell slots" way of handling spells on your plural warlock, then this feature can be a great breakthrough that shows improvement on those switches. Alternatively maybe it's a great meeting in your plural character's headspace where everyone lends their power to the front and that recharges the spells.

Subclasses (Otherworldly Patrons)

The Archfey:

Spells: Many of spells here work well to have delivered by a headmate. Faerie Fire could be the work of a headmate lighting ghostly flames to everything. Sleep and calm emotions might be a headmate reaching out and using passive influence on someone outside of the warlock. Phantasmal force is straight up imposition taken to a magical level. Dominate beast and dominate person can be flavored as a headmate going off to front in another creature's body.

Fey Presence: For a brief moment one of the warlock's headmates shows their true innerworld form.

Beguiling Defenses: This is one of our favorite types of mechanics we code as plural. Instead of being outright immune to being charmed, we flavor it as charms only working on one headmate at a time. When the charm goes off, the warlock switches and a new headmate takes over, completely unfazed by the charm. Alternatively a non-fronting headmate acts like a symptom holder for the charm effect.

Dark Delirium: We like Hurl Through Hell out of the Fiend patron for this type of thing, but Dark Delirium can still be cool and plural as hell. Your warlock opens up their headspace. Their innerworld spills out around them and warps the landscape. The target's mind is drawn into this. There they can only see your warlock, and the inner reaches of your mindscape.

The Celestial:

Spells: Less spells jump out as plural coded beyond the simple "my headmate does it" technique we've been playing with. However, if headmates are different souls for your warlock, Revivify might be a headmate diving into death after a creature to bring their soul back from the brink. Guardian of Faith is an obvious choice for headmate imposition.

Searing Vengeance: This could be one hell of a switch.

The Fathomless:

Spells: Again, mostly spells that we can imagine being delivered or created by headmates. Summon elemental and Bigby's hand are definitely cool ways to have headmates imposed by your warlock.

Tentacle of the Deeps: Like with Bigby's hand, this can be a really cool way for your warlock's non-human giant abyss monster headmate to "leak out" into the world. They are so unfathomable that one warlock body isn't enough to hold them, so they spill out into the world around them.

Guardian Coil: An extension of the above. They're definitely co-con if not co-fronting and they're slapping down attacks.

Grasping Tentacles: Third verse, same as the first. What we really like about this one is that now you can flavor it as the tentacled headmate maintaining the spell entirely themself since damage doesn't break concentration.

Fathomless Plunge: This one can be flavored as a brief jaunt through headspace. Many of your warlock's headspace locations might be connected magically to bodies of water, and with this ability they and their friends can dive through headspace and out of those outerworld locations.

The Fiend:

Spells: Unfortunately most of these fall into our tried and true method of "a wizard did it a headmate cast it".

Dark One's Own Luck: An internal Aid Another action.

Hurl Through Hell: Absolutely one of our most favorite abilities on a plural warlock. Instead of sending them to the lower planes, your warlock sends them to a bad place in their headspace.

The Genie:

Spells: Phantasmal force is again a great way for a headmate to be imposed. Phantasmal killer can likewise be tweaked to do that. Alternatively, it could be through a headmate reaching out into the target's mind to yank something terrifying to the surface. Creation might be something your warlock uses to pull things from their headspace.

Genie's Vessel: If you haven't noticed, we absolutely love it when we can use mechanics to represent headspace on warlock characters. And this one is no exception. Well it does have an exception, kinda. Like with the talisman pact representing a headmate that inhabits an object, this will require your warlock's entire headspace to inhabit an object. Admittedly, the limitation of being able to visit headspace only once per long rest might interfere with a plural character's planned system mechanics though.

Sanctuary Vessel: Extending the above, it's really cool to bring other characters into a plural PC's headspace.

The Great Old One:

Spells: Oh my god the spells! We find psychic stuff to pair really well with plural characters. So the very psychic themed Great Old One patron hits a lot of the right buttons. Even though many of these fall under the "have a headmate cast it" technique, something about them just pops to us. Dissonant whispers comes from a headmate scaring the shit out of somebody. Tasha's Hideous Laughter is some wicked passive influence. Detect thoughts taking the form of a headmate spying on the target's mind. Clairvoyance taking on the form of imposition, but instead of everyone else seeing them like some of the other ideas here, they can see from their imposed location. Telekinesis doing the same but for throwing shit. Sending as system hoping telegrams. And we've already talked about phantasmal force, dominate beast, and dominate person.

Awakened Mind: Like with sending, you can have your warlock use this ability through headmates passing messages back and forth directly into other creature's heads.

Thought Shield: Your warlock's brain has a bouncer of sorts. Or maybe their headspace has really strong walls. Either way, we again love stuff like this on our plural PCs.

Create Thrall: Okay, you can treat this one like straight up possession. When using this ability your warlock sends a headmate into the creature to start fronting in that body.

The Hexblade:

Spells: Aside from phantasmal killer, none of these really pop out at us as especially plural coded. Again though, defaulting to "a headmate cast it" works, especially since a number of the smites are bonus actions.

Hexblade's Curse/Hex Warrior: This has got to be one of our favorite subclasses to get a plural character running, as they literally wield their patron in battle (even though they have little else mechanically that pops out as plural to us). Perhaps the patron is a headmate that was once a great warrior and co-front when cursing a target! Adding Charisma to attack and damage from Hex Warrior can be described with something like a possession state. If you pick up Pact of the Blade, your warlock can pull that headmate out of their headspace directly.

The Undead:

Spells: Phantasmal force and phantom steed work as imposition. Plus, the second one encourages you to give your warlock a non-humanoid headmate, which is cool and doesn't get done enough! Like with revivify mentioned in the Celestial, speak with dead might be something that a headmate can do by going to fetch the mind of the target. Or interestingly enough, perhaps the headmate possesses the body and gives it enough life force to spark up the brain's memories.

Form of Dread: This is some straight up Moon Knight shit right here.

Necrotic Husk: Like with Celestial's Searing Vengeance ability, this can be flavored as one hell of a switch.

Spirit Projection: While it would be cool as hell to be able to have a headmate take over your warlock's body while another goes out in spirit form, the mechanics don't allow this. However, this is still a cool way to get headmates interacting with the world outside of the body.

The Undying:

Spells: Not much here that hasn't been covered already. Legend lore however might be a very cool way to have a headmate drop important exomemories.

Defy Death: A much less flashier version of Searing Vengeance or Necrotic Husk, but still could be a cool way to describe a switch.

Undying Nature: This one is a bit more subtle in how we would code it as plural, but in a magical setting, your plural warlock's headmates might each have their own lifespan that ticks down only while they're fronting. Which in turn leads to a much slower rate of aging.

Spells:

Spells are probably the easiest place to slip some plural coding into a character in 5th edition (or likely any rendition of D&D). As we've stated plenty of times by now, "a headmate cast it" is a perfectly acceptable way of handling a plural spellcaster. A ton of ranged spells work really well as minor magical impositions of headmates (e.g. every ranged attack spell is represented by a headmate imposing themself next to the enemy and giving them a good wack). So we won't be going over every single warlock spell here. Instead, we'll showcase a number of spells that we think really pop.

Mage Hand: Classic minor telekinesis (remember what we said about the Great Old One patron?). This spell allows a headmate to impose themself in the world and move stuff around.

Mind Sliver: System hopping but for mages. A headmate goes into the target's mind and breaks some shit.

Minor Illusion: A lot of illusion spells will be great for imposition. It only works to impose a headmate's voice. But, you can pull in stuff from your character's headspace and have them impose that for objects.

Armor of Agathys: A ghostly headmate surrounds your warlock's body in protective force and slaps anyone that would hurt their vessel.

Arms of Hadar: Imposing a mosh pit of headmates. Hell yes.

Comprehend Languages: Call up a headmate that knows a different language to sit in co-con and translate for the system.

Unseen Servant: An upgraded mage hand. Although it is listed as mindless, we can just say that the headmate imposed is just using the warlock's brain to do their thinking.

Borrowed Knowledge: Another spell for cool switching/co-fronting! This can really give some satisfaction to the phenomenon of different headmates having different skills in the real world without making it feel like each individual headmate has less skills than a given singlet of the same class and Intelligence score.

Crown of Madness: The first possession like spell on the list. Perhaps change up the visual flair to suit a specific headmate that does the possessing. But otherwise this spell can look like sending a headmate into the target to passively influence them into attacking specific creatures.

Mind Spike: An upgraded mind sliver. While your warlock maintains the spell, their headmate stows away in the target's mind, reporting back their location.

Suggestion: Passive influence, but for other creatures!

Hunger of Hadar: Another spell that can be a cool way to bring your warlock's headspace onto the battlefield.

Intellect Fortress: Like the Great Old One's Thought Shield, you can use this to describe a well fortified headspace.

Major Image: A bit more powerful than minor illusion, but this one will let your warlock impose their headmates' bodies. It takes focus to maintain the imposition (like it does for a lot of systems that do imposition in the real world), but since this is fantasy at least everyone else can see them.

Summons: This post will get way longer than it already is if we talk about every single summon spell. So to save on word length, summon spells can be a really cool way to manifest a headmate in D&D, as usually you as the player get to control their actions, so you won't run into any issues with the summon acting in ways that the headmate they represent wouldn't act.

Tongues: An upgraded comprehend languages. With this spell, the headmates that know the obscure languages are all co-fronting.

Banishment: For a bit of flavor and fun, with your DM's permission, you might be able to have the harmless demiplane be your warlock's headspace. If your DM is particularly cool with it, your warlock's non-fronting headmates might get to chat with the target too, creating a fun roleplaying scene.

Hallucinatory Terrain: Useful for imposing your warlock's headspace again.

Raulothim's Psychic Lance: An upgraded mind sliver. This time your warlock can send a headmate hunting for the creature instead of charging directly at them.

Shadow of Moil: Another take on armor of agathys.

Contact Other Plane: Any soulbonders who have internal telephone like connections can probably see how this spell is related to plurality.

Danse Macabre: As the name implies, it is a bit macabre, but your warlock sending out headmates to possess corpses for a rave does sound cool.

Dream: Deam based system hopping.

Create Undead: This one can work for sending headmates out to possess corpses. The limitation of losing control of the ghouls (as a player) after 24 hours without recasting the spell presents a real problem for that though. How to explain that limitation in the fiction will be up to you and your DM. Perhaps they will be cool with the ghouls simply collapsing and the headmates returning to the warlock's body. Perhaps you will be cool with the story made by headmates permanently leaving your warlock's system and being under the control of the DM.

Mass Suggestion: Like suggestion, but your warlock's entire system goes running around passive influencing a crowd.

Soul Cage: Your warlock temporarily gains a new headmate! Okay your warlock does so in a shitty way, but that can be reflavored.

Demiplane: Direct transportation into your warlock's headspace!

Dominate Monster: Another possession like spell for sending headmates to start fronting in other creature's bodies.

Imprisonment: Another spell that you can flavor as sending a creature into your warlock's headspace using the Hedged Prison version of the spell.

Psychic Scream: The final upgrade to mind sliver. Send your warlock's whole system to beat up nearly a dozen creatures.

Weird: The ultimate upgrade to phantasmal killer discussed above.

Final Words

We hope you enjoyed this (much longer than planned) bit of plural joy. This is the class that inspired us to make this side blog. We aren't all that into traditional media, so we don't get to participate in headcannoning plural characters all that often. So instead we headcannon character options in TTRPGs!

Hopefully if you were inspired by our Playing Plural PCs in Literally Any TTRPG post, or you have just been thinking about playing a Plural PC, you'll find this some more inspiration or ideas on how to use the mechanics of 5e's Warlock to represent your character's system.

If this post did inspire anything, we would love to hear! If you have used warlock to play a plural character we would also love to hear! Or if have plural ideas for the warlock class that we didn't cover, let us know and we would be happy to share!!

[pluralpcs]

Y'all might be interested in hearing about our plural D&D character! Basically, we have the backstory that a hydra tried to eat a very powerful wizard, who decided to twist the knife by permanently Polymorphing them into a halfling. But since each hydra head has their own consciousness, the end result wound up being one very plural halfling trying to adjust to having to share more of the body than usual and dealing with the culture clash between hydra culture and more humanoid cultures. Their goal: to find the wizard to get revenge, and/or find a way to get Polymorphed back into a hydra.

One of the fun things we have going on with them is that each of them has a preferred fighting style and several fronting triggers that can happen in combat, so often they end up dropping their weapons and equipping new ones mid-combat, totally changing their fighting style based on who's up front. Helps that they're a ranger, so there's legit a lot of ways they can make themselves useful with a variety of weapons and even a little spellcasting. We're looking forward to fighting an enemy intelligent enough to get thrown off by the constantly-shifting combat styles; so far it's mostly been animals who don't really have the wherewithal to try and predict our moves at all.

Oh that sounds so cool!

We absolutely love hearing about and sharing stories of plural characters!

I don't think that plural advasaries are thought about much, so it's really cool seeing that take on the hydra (which also makes perfect sense)!

[pluralpcs]

That's entirely fair!

We had a hard time finding words for this section, and I don't think that what we ended up with was exactly what we were trying to say. What was on our mind at the time when writing that (what inspired us to make this blog!) was singlets discussing playing characters with "multiple personalities". And this was an attempt at talking to those types of players specifically. I doubt that they will often even make the connection between spiritual possession/cohabitation and MPD or the diagnostic labels that followed it.

The plural PCs post is really cool and I'm posting this here because I don't want to derail that awesome post with a really minor nitpick... but...

That's not actually true, is it?

I know these are most associated with plurality, but I feel the "person possessed by/sharing a body with a spiritual entity" is a form of plurality that appears in fiction far more commonly than DID/OSDD, right?

[pluralpcs]

we are currently playing a plural character. we didn't originally plan fir the character to be a system, because we started playing the character before we discovered we are a system. when lookin back, after realizing we are a system, we saw the inconsistency in how we played the character, and so, since we are a system who plays a character, we thought it will make sense to decide the character was an unaware system. it was also easier thanks to a few times we slipped up and used "we" instead of "i", because now.it was suddenly the character saying it for a good reason. we did the reveal by asking the dm that when the character was revived after being killed, because reviving gives a body based of the soul, that whenever they switch, their body will slightly change to match the headmate. and this resulted in them realizing their plurality, since they had a clear sign to look for something whenever they switched.

favorite moment from making this work was when we explained to the dm that we want to play a plural character with a non-magical source, and we described it us "it's like playing an autistic character, autism isn't magic", and now autism isn't magic is a great catchphrase of ours

thinking of potentially coming out to the rest of the group soon (a third already know)

That's really cool!

We had a really similar experience with a changling psychic we were playing during our syscovery.

"Autism isn't magic" is indeed a great catchphrase!

Good luck coming out to your group!

[pluralpcs]

So You're a Singlet and Want to Play a Plural PC?

We see this come up from time to time. A singlet wants to play a character with "multiple personalities" or something like that.

We think that's really cool! The advice and information on this blog is free for anyone to use to have fun!

But there's likely a few things to consider if you're singular and are trying to play a plural character.

For the Edge!

We are not fans of considering things "cringe". We definitely cause people to cringe at our self expression. Hell, this entire sideblog could wind up on a cringe subreddit some day. So we are not against making "edgy" characters.

But we do have to admit that there are players out there who make characters for what seem to be the sole reason of being edgy. And that in and of itself isn't wrong or bad (we have some real edgelords in our character portfolio). It just happens to be the case that sometimes these players won't mesh well with the rest of their table, or they might stray into the territory of mockery.

Dissociative Identity Disorder and Otherwise Specified Dissociative Disorder type 1 (or Multiple Personality Disorder if you're getting old school with your language) are stigmatized disorders, which in turn means that there will be players that slap them onto their characters to make the character more tragic, serious, or otherwise edgy. These aren't the only ways to be plural, or for plural characters to exist, but they are probably the most popular depictions.

So it might be tempting to just give a character an edgy alternate personality state. But it's important to not make a caricature. Just like you shouldn't make stereotypes of other identities and disorders, you should be kind with your plural ones. Don't rely on stereotypes or negative media depictions. Consider the fact that DID and OSDD-1 are common enough that you have probably met people with those disorders. Yes it's an extreme disorder for some of us, but for others it's just kinda, part of our lives (and for many it's somewhere in between).

Do Some Research

Simple as. This follows from avoiding stereotypes and caricatures. Look up other plural blogs. Read some threads on r/plurals. Listen to plural folk about our experiences. Hell, if you know some systems maybe talk to them about the idea for a character. Keep an open mind. Be willing to change your concepts about your character and plurality around.

Be a Few Team Players

A lot of advice for working with a group of other players will likely apply well to your plural character. It sucks ass to have that one character that's always trying to roll to pick pocket the other PCs. It still sucks when that character is a headmate of a plural PC. Keep in mind that you're playing a game with a group of other people, even if your playing a group of people sharing a body.

Our best advice for playing plural characters is the same as our general advice to other real life plurals: to think of the collective as being an internal team. Try to make sure that the different headmates of your PC are not at each others' throats constantly. When one headmate makes a promise to another PC, the other headmates should take responsibility with keeping that promise. If your plural PC is adventuring with a group of other PCs, then all of the headmates should be to some extent on board with this.

Of course, this advice can always be broken when it's worth it to the group and the story. Just like it can be fun and narratively appropriate for two PCs to get into a fight with each other, it can be fun and narratively appropriate for two headmates to come into conflict.

Something Special

There's something to be said about wanting to be special. People want to be special. And when they make characters, they want those characters to be special. And oftentimes those things are thrown at people as an accusation to grind them down and make them shut up. But everyone's special. Everyone has a whole ass life that they've lived that has uniqueness and commonality to it.

This is true of PCs as well. If you make a plural character, you're making a character that's special. And so are your singular PCs. It's likely the assumption that your character is singular, so it feels special or rare to make one that's explicitly plural. But all of the characters at your table are in some way special or rare. That's true by virtue of the fact that they're the characters your story and game focuses on.

So if you're playing a plural character, remember that while they are special, they are no more special than the rest of the PCs at the table. Share the spotlight. Engage with each other. Invest in everyone's story. Lift each other up.

[pluralpcs]

Playing Plural PCs in Literally Any TTRPG

For our first post, before diving into mechanical ways of playing a plural character, we want to focus on something very important:

You do not need special mechanics to play a plural character.

This blog is a fun little project that we're doing because we love to see mechanical representation of our plurality in the games we play. But regardless of the game you play, the systems you use, or the setting you tell stories in, you can always play a plural character.

To play a plural character in any setting or system, simply play your character as plural!

No really, it's that simple.

But how to do it?

In just about every game we've come across, there are no mechanical limitations that get in the way of plurality. Nor are there any narrative constraints that stop a character from being more than one. Nothing stops you from slapping an ampersand on the end of your character's name, or writing their system name in the name field.

While mechanically there's nothing that differentiates a plural character from a singular character built this way, there are some interesting spins you can take.

Dissociative Dice

A common experience among systems is different headmates having different aptitudes. Some headmates might be better with certain tasks, or they might handle situations better than others. Weave this into your narrative. When you roll really well on a certain action or skill check, you could have one of your PC's headmates switch or start co-fronting. If you roll really poorly, perhaps another headmate took over or was front stuck.

Scene Switches

Alternatively (or additionally), your character could have switches between scenes or encounters. Maybe rolling initative is a front trigger for one of the headmates, so the character changes demeanor and attitude when combat starts. Or your character has a host that does all of the talking in social situations. You can have fun and build on this as you play by considering what would happen when a headmate fronts in a situation they aren't used to.

More meta

Another common experience is memory issues. And a common issue in TTRPGs is forgetting what your character might have learned 20 minutes ago in game, because that was last session which was two weeks ago. So if you want to, you can play with that metagame forgetfulness in character. Perhaps you the player get a refresher from the GM about last session by your character asking an NPC to fill them in.

And of course you can swap or combine these approaches how you like. Maybe someone got frontstuck when you botched an initiative roll for combat and so it takes them a moment to switch out, or they have to lean on muscle memory and their headmate's advice during the fight. Maybe you flub a check to decipher some clues because the socialite headmate is extremely bored of the situation and is extremely distracting in co-con.

Some problems and pitfalls

Sharing the Spotlight

Likely if you're playing a TTRPG, you'll be doing so with other bodies. You'll have other players at the table with their own characters getting their own screen time. This means you'll need to share the spotlight with them. Which in turn can feel like there's not a lot of time to highlight your plural character's internal dynamics. If every PC is getting equal screen time, then inherently the headmates of your plural PC will have less time than the singular PCs.

There's a plethora of advice out there about the social aspects of TTRPGs; the metagame conversations, communication, boundaries, etc. A lot of will apply here. Ways to avoid taking the spotlight away from other PCs will apply just the same if some of those PCs are plural. Likewise, you have a right to have fun, and so asking for more time to explore and showcase the way that your character's system works is perfectly reasonable.

Mechanical Mismatch

Depending on the game system (heh) that you're using, you might find some specific nuances that affect how your character, and in turn their system works. For example, if a game system or setting deals with going into the mindscapes of characters, this might impose some rules on your PC's headspace. Or, if a character's soul is a tangible thing that's dealt with through game features and dice, then a plural PC with multiple souls inhabiting one body may run into issues.

You should talk to your gaming group about these mechanical issues. It should never stop your character from being plural, but you may have to have a conversation when that changes the mechanics. Perhaps your group will decide on homebrew or house rules, or perhaps your plural PC will work a bit differently than you intended.

Shitty Strangers

If you're looking to play plural characters with a group of people you're not entirely familiar with, you may run into people who are close minded or bigoted. This overlaps a lot with the struggles of having a plural identity in the world. This can take all sorts of forms from acting like your character is impossible, to telling you that you're appropriating a very serious disorder, to cringing at an authentic display of enthusiasm. Sometimes there are people that are assholes and they happen to also play TTRPGs.

It sucks and you don't have to stand for it. You might find it worthwhile to educate them about plurality. You might call them on their bullshit. You might just simply tell them that they're actions are harmful. Or you might find it healthier to just leave. If you try to bring your plural character to a table, and get a bad vibe, it's entirely within your rights to reconsider gaming with that group.

You do not need special mechanics to play a plural character.

While all of this stuff is stuff to consider, it's always important to remember that TTRPGs are for having fun. And if you have fun playing a plural character, then you should, regardless of the system or setting that you're using.

[pluralpcs]

Welcome to Plural Player Characters

This is a sideblog dedicated to building and playing plural characters in table top roleplaying games like Dungeons & Dragons and Pathfinder, FATE, Chronicles of Darkness, or really any ttrpg we find interesting!

If you've played a plural character in a ttrpg, we would be happy to share your stories. Tell us how you built your character, how you incorporated plurality into your stories, or just the kinds of shenanigans that your PluralPCs got up to. Feel free to send in asks about what kinds of mechanics and homebrew you use or are looking for, or for advice on how to play one.

Why play a plural character?

There's plenty of reasons someone might want to play a plural character. They might be part of a plural collective and like to see their identity showing up at the table. They might want to play with their headmates but don't want to run multiple PCs. They might be a questioning system looking to explore their identity. They might have a really cool concept for a character who's also plural. Or just simply because plurals exist. The same question can be asked of any identity.

Why does this blog exist?

We are a system who's been playing tabletop rpgs for nearly two decades. We've played a host of different game systems and read even more. We've also played a lot of plural characters (and built a ton more), whether we knew it at the time or not. And whenever plurality and TTRPGs come close, we have a lot of thoughts, ideas, and builds. So this is a place we want to share those things.